


Tell Me You Love Me, Scully

by PjStafford



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-12
Updated: 2017-01-15
Packaged: 2018-09-17 00:38:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 26,721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9296564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PjStafford/pseuds/PjStafford
Summary: Canon compliant exploration of MSR with the twist- Mulder will not have casual sex.





	1. The Sex Talk

Mulder is gazing at Scully. He finds himself doing that more frequently these days. He is an expert profiler, but after four years he cannot figure her out. He knows she knows him better than anyone alive, but does he know her -really? He knows the woman who wears the cross, performs autopsies, pretend that she doesn’t find his jokes funny. Does he know the woman who gets a tattoo, has a one night stand with a stranger, is about to do the wild thing with a man pretending to be him? How has the isolation of working on the X files changed her? How has her diagnosis of cancer changed her? The loss of her sister? Her abduction? How much, in other words, has all the misfortune that seems to come from being his partner changed her? He knows there has been some awkwardness between them recently. He blames himself. He ponders how to make things right.

Mulder looks away soon as Scully looks up and over at him. He does that every time. She has tried to hold a pose a little longer when she feels his gaze upon her- to be sure he is in fact looking at her as intently as he seems to be. She likes that he gazes at her. It is sometimes with admiration. Other times he looks at her with the same look he gives clues to a difficult case. She is ok with either gaze. She knows Mulder. The only way to keep his interest for any length of time is to be a bit of a mystery he is always unraveling. As to the admiration of her physical being, well, that is flattering and she definitely admires his physical being: his eyes, lips, biceps-just his physical presence that seems to fill up a space in an unique way.

As Scully gazes upon Mulder while thinking about Mulder gazing at her, he looks back at her and smiles smugly. He is so adept at looking away just as she looks over at him, but she has not learned that trick. This often leaves her blushing or glancing away when he catches her gazing at him. This time, though, she holds his gaze and smiles. Her smile prompts Mulder to ask, “What are you doing this week-end?”

“Not working, Mulder, so don’t even think about it.”

“No, but it's a Friday night and that Agent Thomas asked you to happy hour. He’s a good looking, strong, handsome male of the species. Why not take him up on it?”

“He asked us to happy hour, Mulder, both of us, and with a group of other agents. He was just being polite.”

“He was being polite by asking me, but he made a special trip to the basement to ask you.” Scully wonders if there is a hint of jealousy in Mulder’s voice or if it is just her wishful thinking. She had been out with Agent Thomas and the other agents before. They kept referring to Mulder as Spooky. She didn’t want to be part of anybody ridiculing her eccentric, but genius partner.

“Do you get lonely, Scully? Working here in the basement office with Spooky Mulder? Don’t you miss the companionship of going out for drinks or dinner after work on a Friday afternoon? Here it is 4 p.m. and in this building every single agent except you and me are planning where they’re heading to when the clock hits five.”

“Mulder, I said no for both of us to Agent Thomas, but I shouldn’t have spoken for you. Did you want to go? Are you lonely?”

They gaze now into each other eyes as if willing the other person to read his/her thoughts. Scully sees the loneliness in Mulder’s eyes and Mulder believes he sees in Scully’s eyes a fear of dying before she has actually lived life fully. Mulder shakes his head. “I’m not lonely, Scully. I have you.”

At 7 p.m that evening Scully has showered and changed into her most comfortable long sleeved two piece cotton pajamas. She has washed her hair and finger combed it only so it is curly and unkept. She puts on a warm, comfortable robe when the pizza boy knocks and accepts the pepperoni, mushroom pizza. He is her usual pizza boy and they are talking about his up coming graduation from high school when Mulder walks up with a six pack of beer. “Please tell me you remembered the anchovies, Scully.”

The pizza boy leaves. Mulder and Scully walk into her apartment. Scully is uncomfortable. She has not anticipated Mulder coming over tonight. He has not been over since the night when he burst into her apartment gun drawn to protect her and found her about to kiss a man she thought was him. “I thought about bringing a bottle of wine, Scully, but…” Mulder has picked up on Scully’s mood. He realizes maybe he has miscalculated coming over unannounced. “Beer is better with pizza, Mulder.” She doesn’t ask him why he is there as she wants to. She gets plates and napkins while he opens the beer.

At first they talk about nothing of importance. Finished with the second beer, done with the pizza and now on their third beer, Mulder tentatively approaches the subject he came here tonight to talk about with Scully: Sex.

“We never really talked about that night, Scully, when Eddie was here instead of me.” “I don’t want to talk about it. It's embarrassing.” “That’s why we need to talk about it- so we are not embarrassed. We should be able to talk about anything, Scully.” Scully looks at Mulder warily. “Mulder, I had too much to drink.”

Mulder realizes he is handling this poorly. “I don’t want you to apologize. I don’t want you to explain. We all have sexual desires, Scully.”

Scully feels herself blush. Is this the moment he tells her that he is interested in her? Instead he brings up another subject she isn’t comfortable discussing.

“Scully, you know I take care of my needs with pornography and phone sex.” He is matter of fact about it. “I’m not ashamed of that.”

Scully blurts out what every female agent at the FBI wonders: “but why don’t you date, Mulder?”

Mulder looks surprised. “I date, Scully. I just don’t date women I work with.”

“But you never talk about your dates.”

“Well, I don’t date a lot. Most of the women I meet are from work.” He stands up and walks around the living room uncomfortably. “Scully, I don’t have casual sex. I only have sex with a woman after we’ve said I love you.”

She was not expecting that. Mulder, a deliberate celibate, a romantic, saving himself for the right woman? Her face expresses her surprise. “It's not a morality thing, Scully.” Mulder remembers the last time he had casual sex. He was working a case in Los Angeles when Scully was missing. It was a slip and the woman ended up dead. “It's to protect myself. Scully, I just fall hard. I think of sex and love together and I confuse myself in a way. I can’t have sex without falling in love and if the woman doesn’t love me, I get hurt.” Mulder thinks of Phoebe and her cavalier attitude towards multiple partners. He thinks about a partner he did have a romantic relationship with and how she had left him. Mulder sits down on the couch and looks at his hands. “Scully, my heart breaks easily and I don’t like to be left. I know I seem cool and calm but in this way I’m not strong enough.” He looks directly in Scully’s eyes. She remembers the case a few weeks ago where Mulder was convinced he had met his soulmate he had love over lifetimes and how upset he was when she took her own life even though they had just met. Yes, she knows, when he falls he falls deeply.

“Are you saying you don’t think you will ever fall in love?”

Mulder shakes his head. “I want to be in love. I hope it will happen for me, but I will need to know we both love each other before I commit. In the meantime, phone sex is anonymous and pornography isn’t real- it's fantasy, but it gives me the relief every human needs until I meet the woman who I can be in love with and who can love me back.”

Scully sits back and thinks. Is he explaining why he hasn’t made a pass at her or trying to tell her he never will?

“Mulder, thank you for telling me. It makes me feel differently about your pornography habits.”

“Scully, I need to make sure you know, though, it's not a morality thing. I don’t judge what other people do. I know I was upset about you being with that guy, and the tattoo, and then Eddie, but I just don’t want you to put yourself in harms way.”

Scully sighs. Do they really have to talk about this? She starts to explain again. Mulder interrupts.

“Scully, you have needs. You don’t have to apologize or explain. That’s what I really wanted to tell you. I know lots of agents who when they are on the road take the opportunity with a stranger in a strange town. I don’t want you to think you can’t do that on the road because of me. You should do what you need to do without fear of me getting upset. I know I have gotten upset but I won’t. You can do whatever you need to do. Just promise me you will be careful.”

Un-oh. He said something wrong. He can tell by that look in her eyes. Scully thinks to herself that she doesn’t know what is worse: his telling her there was no future between them, the fact that he thinks she is a slut or his patronizing arrogance over thinking he has any say in her life.

“Thank you, Mulder, for your permission to have consensual sex with whoever in the Hell I want to. Now that I have your permission I feel so much better. That’s just what I was waiting for is your permission.”

This is not how he meant for this evening to go. He was hoping it would relieve some of the stress between them. Clear the air. Instead he finds himself out in her hallway with the door being slammed in his face. What has he said to upset her so much? He is really struggling with trying to figure her out. 


	2. Scully is Alive!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Timeframe. Chapter 5 between ReduxII and Detour

Timeframe season 5 between Redux Part two and Detour)

Such a silly waste of time. Mulder has dragged Scully to a town in Maine to investigate an UFO siting that turns out to be such an obvious hoax he threatens the teenage boys involved with fraud charges just to scare them straight. Scully meets with the boys’ parents to explain the seriousness of their actions, but does not include the fact, as Mulder would have, that it is a disservice to real UFO sitings and sincere UFO followers. Mulder apologizes profusely to Scully for wasting her time, but she tells him she likes it when the cases are clearly hoaxes. They could close a case as solved and, generally, no real threat of danger ever came their way in hoaxes and they almost never disagreed about the cases. Scully admits that she is surprised how few of the cases ended up being pure hoaxes.

Truthfully, Mulder just wanted to get her out of the office and into the field. When Scully returned to work following her illness, he had created a bunch of file reviews based on new findings in paranormal research. He had wanted her to regain her strength. Then this damn teamwork retreat had been scheduled for next week and he knew the best way for Scully and him to work on their “teamwork” was in the field. Now with the case closed late afternoon, they are in Maine for the evening with no work to occupy them.

Mulder convinces Scully to let him take take her out for Maine lobster at a four star restaurant. He is surprised when she readily says yes. She had seen a boutique earlier and shops for an appropriate dress. She finds a red dress with a tight bodice. It hangs below her knees and shows no cleavage but the tightness and the fit on her petite frame emphasizes her curves.

They sit across from one another sipping a Grand Cru Chardonnay. Mulder has not allowed Scully to see the menu. He knows she would resist the $300 price tag for the premiere French wine, but he is celebrating in style. Every dime is worth it. Butter is dripping down Scully’s chin and she is is smiling, laughing, eating and talking. She is vibrantly alive and in the moment. Mulder orders her another ala carte lobster. She protests that it is too much. He uses his napkin to wipe her mouth and pours more wine into her glass.

Scully asks him why he is trying to fatten her up. He takes her hand and absent-mindedly runs his fingers up and down her arm. She has become so thin since her illness. She reads his mind.

“The only benefit from cancer is the rapid weight loss. I want to try and keep this figure.” Mulder smiles at her. They have not discussed her cancer, her miraculous cure, the chip in her neck. He motions the wait staff to bring the chocolate torte he had ordered ahead for their desert. He knows she will never resist no matter how much she protests. She eats the first bite with her eyes shut and then greedily takes a second, third, fourth bite. “I need to do something to work off the calories,” she says. “Come running with me tonight, Scully.” For years Mulder has tried to convince her to join him on the jogs he takes in every new town. She has always refused as she does now.

“How about dancing, Mulder? That would be the perfect activity following this perfect dinner.”

Scully asks the waiter about dancing in the town. It is mid-week which makes it more difficult. The only thing the waiter can suggest is the local country bar. It is ladies night so they can sometimes get a big crowd. Scully tells the waiter that Mulder is really more of an Elvis or Hendrix fan. The waiter pours the last of the bottle of wine and Scully realizes she has drank more wine than Mulder, ate most of the desert and had an extra lobster. Mulder has been happy just to watch her enjoy herself.

Now he says that he will be happy to go to the country bar with her. They might stand out a little the way they are dressed, but…. She shakes her head. “I hate country music as much as you do, Mulder.” He looks at her quizzically. “You do hate country music don’t you, Mulder?” He smiles sheepishly, avoids eye contact and shrugs his shoulder. “Actually when I do go out on dates I often take women line dancing. I’m pretty good.” He glances at her briefly and blushes. She realizes she has never heard Mulder speak disparagingly of country music. She had made the assumption based on his intelligent discourse that he wouldn’t like country music. “I thought I knew everything about you.” “Well, not everything.”

Scully finishes her wine and realizes she is tipsy. “Oh, we are so going. I won’t dance, but I will watch you.” “Who will I dance with, Scully?” “It's ladies night, Mulder.” Mulder begins to protest that it will be boring for her. Scully, tipsy and talkative, says again “oh, no, we are going.” She laughs. “Mulder, before we left the office this morning I was in the restroom- in the stall- and some women, not knowing I was in there, were talking about you. ‘The only thing Spooky about him is how hard it is to stop thinking about him. He looks you in the eyes and it's all you can think about.’ ‘I like to watch his lips when he talks.’ ‘My favorite view is him walking away.’ I had to stay in the stall until they left.” Mulder doesn’t know how to respond, but Scully is not through. “Now tonight I get to see that behind shaking. Oh, we are going.”

Mulder looks at her in surprise. “Scully, if I said anything that objectifying about you…” Before he finishes he sees frown lines appear on Scully’s forehead. No, he thinks to himself, I am not going to ruin this evening “but I like being objectified. Let's go to the bar.”

They attract immediate attention by the way they are dressed. Mulder orders them each a beer and Scully adds two shots of tequila to the order. She tells the waitress that “my brother” really wants to dance. Would she spread the word to any of the ladies in the bar that he is just looking for an invitation? Mulder removes his tie and jacket and drinks his shot before the first woman approaches. He has multiple offers and spends the next two hours dancing.

Scully is surprised and appreciative of how well Mulder knows the moves: when to clap, when to move to the back, when to slide, slide. Then she is appreciative of how well he dances, how his hip curves in and his straight posture. Finally she is just watching him. He is such an athlete, she thinks. He swims, runs, plays basketball and baseball. That’s why that ass is so tight. That's why his back muscles ripples through his shirt, that’s why…

Then he is back at the table, grabbing the check, saying they better go-it is getting late. He looks at the check and frowns. “How many tequila shots have you had, Scully?” She shakes her head. She has lost count, but it has been a couple of hours. Mulder looks at her- has she really drank three beers and five shots of tequila? That explains why her cheeks are flushed, her eyes have a heightened sparkle, her mouth is open and her breath is a little more rapid than usual. Mulder is sober after two hours of dancing without drinking. As Scully stands up she is off-balanced, leaning towards her left as she walks. Mulder pus his arm around her to help balance her.

On the way back to the hotel he rolls down the window so cool air will hit her face. She asks him if he owns a pair of cowboy boots and a cowboy hat. Boots, yes, hat no. It is a short drive to the hotel. He walks her to the door, takes the key out of her hand to open it, and follows her in. “Scully, do you need help? I could get out your pajamas for you.” She appears a little lost in the middle of the room and suddenly starts to slide to the floor. Mulder grabs her and sits her in the only chair in the room. “Mulder, I am starving.” “Starving?” “I noticed the gas station across the street has sausages on a stick. Could you get me one? Jalapeño –with mustard.” Mulder shakes his head incredulously. “You want me to buy you a sausage on a stick from a gas station?” Scully nods, “When I saw them this morning, I so wanted one. I haven’t been able to stop thinking of them.” Scully, you always leave me guessing.” On his walk to the gas station he thinks, “$500 for dinner and what she really wanted was a sausage on a stick from a gas station.”

Scully walks to the restroom. She brushes her teeth with a new toothpaste-especially minty, washes her face, removes her make-up, pulls out a silk nightgown, different than what she usually wears that her mother had bought her, sits back in the chair. When Mulder comes back the only place for him to sit will be on the bed which is just where she wants him.

When Mulder hands her the sack and plops down on the bed, leaning against the headboard, she takes the sausage out and smells it. Then she puts down the sausage on the table. “Mulder, you should kiss me now?”

“What?” Mulder sits up in the bed. What is she talking about?

Scully is very drunk still and slurs her words. “I used new toothpaste. I taste like mint, but after I eat this sausage I will have really bad breathe, so you should kiss me now.”

“That makes perfect sense, Scully, if I had been planning on kissing you.”

Scully looks confused. “You don’t usually kiss your dates good night?”

Mulder hadn’t thought of tonight as a date. He thought of it as a celebration, but not a date. As he thinks of it now, though, extravagant wine, nice dinner, dancing. He guesses Scully had thought of it as a date. He doesn’t want to hurt her feelings. “Scully, on the first date, I usually just kiss the girl on the cheek.” He crosses to her and kisses her clerk chastely. He touches her lips with his index finger. “We will need to wait for the kiss on the mouth for another occasion.” He notices her silk nightgown and her nipples sticking out through the fabric. “I should go.” “No. Mulder, not yet, please.” She looks at him with her soft blue eyes. He nods and returns to the bed.

Scully thinks to herself that he is not getting away that easy. She picks up the sausage on a stick. It is about 6 inches, red, almost angry looking. She holds it up perpendicular in front of her and grabs the mustard. “With these sausages, I like to put the mustard just on the bottom on the base. Then, I lick at the mustard with my tongue.” Scully’s tongue flicks in and out as she turns the sausage around barely touching the base with her tongue. “Then, I try to drag the mustard up to the top with my tongue.” She puts her tongue firmly against the mustard and drags her tongue up the full length of the sausage. She repeats this several times turning the sausage around.” “Then I like to taste the tip before I take it all in my mouth.”

“Scully,” Mulder’s voice is more amused than exasperated. “Is the sole reason you sent me out for that sausage so you could fuck with me?” Scully’s blue eyes sparkles. She pretends to have misheard him. “Mulder, did you ask me to fuck you?” Mulder laughs. “Scully, say fuck again.” Now, we are getting somewhere, Scully thinks, and tries to make her voice sound deep and hoarse like Lauren Bacall’s. “Fuck.” Mulder giggles this time. “Scully, have you ever even said that word before?” “Mulder, you’ve heard me use the word before.” “When you stub your toe or in anger, but not about sex not as in ‘I want to fuck you, baby.’ It doesn’t sound like you.” When Mulder says “I want to fuck you, baby,” his voice lowers, the words seem to vibrate in his chest and float up and out of his mouth like caramel just beginning to melt. Scully looks at him open mouthed. Mulder is unaware how sexy his voice sounded. “You just don’t have to work that hard, Scully. You’re sexy when you walk, sit, breathe, argue with me. You’re the sexist woman I’ve ever met.”

“Then why don’t you want to?” Scully is afraid if she says fuck again he will laugh at her again. “Scully, you’re drunk. A man doesn't with a woman whose drunk. Besides I’ve told you why before.” Scully bites into the sausage. Mulder watches her quietly for a few minutes before he says, “you get horny when you’ve been drinking, Scully. There’s a pattern.” “It just can’t be that I want to have sex with an incredibly handsome man? It just can’t be that I want to fuck you?” They sit in quiet a bit longer while Scully finishes her sausage.

“Scully, I’m flattered, but sex changes things for better or worse. It would change us.” Scully wipes the mustard off her fingers. Her drunkenness is wearing off. Mulder thinks she looks sad. This is definitely not how he wanted the night to end. He tries to explain more fully. “The thing is, Scully, you almost died. We both thought you were going to die.” Mulder voice breaks. He finds it suddenly hard to breathe as the residue emotions of fear and sadness from the recent past surfaces. “We almost lost what we had- what we have. I would never heard you say fuck or see you eat a sausage or have you roll your eyes at me.” Mulder begins to cry at first softly and then louder. “I just got this back. I can’t risk losing you. My God, Scully, what would I have done if you had died?” He hadn’t known he would burst into tears. He hadn’t known he had needed to tell her this, but tonight she is so alive. He is so grateful.

Scully walks over to the bed. She sits beside him and slowly wraps her arms around him. He holds her tight sobbing- as if she is the life jacket keeping him from drowning. “You’re the only one I can trust.”She strokes the back of his neck, presses her cheek against his, moves her head to his chest and settles there until his crying subsides. Mulder says in a quiet voice, “you have become the most important person in my life.” He is bending down to look at her as she looks up at him. Their mouths are inches apart.   
“Scully, you weren’t kidding about the sausage breath.” She slaps him playfully and sits up rapidly. She then holds out her hand and says, “oh no.” “What Scully? Are you ok?” “I’m kind of dizzy.” “Yeah, will half a bottle of wine, three beers and five tequila shots, you’ve actually done pretty good not to have passed out.”

Mulder disengages from her, brings her aspirin, water and a cold compress. He settles her in bed, pulls the blanket up. He whispers he will stay until she falls asleep in case she needs anything. He sits in the chair long after she falls asleep. He looks at this vibrant woman who makes his days worth living. He tries to come to grips with the true nature of his feelings towards her and what it might mean for his future. 


	3. Time Passes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Timeframe Season 6 after Tithonus

 

And time yet for a hundred indecisions,  
And for a hundred visions and revisions,  
Before the taking of a toast and tea. (Love song of J. Alfred Prufrock, T.S. Eliot)

Mulder cannot get those lines out of head as he makes dry toast and hot tea in Scully’s kitchen. He had slept on her couch last night after bringing her back from the hospital. This morning she is awake, still not hungry, but had agreed to toast and tea which he had insisted he would bring her in bed. Then he will go home to shower and dress for work. Scully’s mother will come by this morning to spend the day and a night. Then Scully says she would be fine to take care of herself and recovered enough in a couple of weeks to return to light duty work.

A watched pot never boils, Mulder thinks, waiting for the tea kettle’s whistle. Then, he returns to thinking of the Eliot poem. It is such a depressing poem of an old man looking back at a measured life and wondering about missed opportunities. A poem about the tedium of long years without taking chances. Of course, he often took chances as did Scully which has put their lives at repeated risk. In some areas they take many chances, but, in their personal relationships, they took great care not to risk; not to dare.

Over a year since he had cried while holding her in his arms asking what would he have done if she had died. Two Christmases have passed. She had not died of cancer and not of the gunshot wound she received at the hands of a different partner. She had not died and so there would be time yet for a hundred indecisions.

The tea kettle finally whistles. He pours the water over the tea bag and thinks of another verse of the poem:

And would it have been worth it, after all,  
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,  
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,  
Would it have been worth while,

Time had not passed slowly and there had been no tedium. In the last year, Scully had found out she had a daughter, Emily, who had died. She had found out she was barren and then when he told her he had discovered and stored her ovum, she had asked him to be a sperm donor. It had been a long shot and it hadn’t worked. He had watched her deal with the reality she would never be a biological mother. He had watched knowing he could not help. They had come so close to the truth and to the proof, a child mind reader, him rescuing Scully before seeing a spaceship rise into the air. So close and then kicked out of theX-files, his life’s work. Ok, there has been some tedium in the past year with the work they had been assigned to punish them.

Then, there had been the return of Diana. Diana! She had made it clear she wanted to rekindle their relationship. He still did love her. He didn’t really know how to stop loving someone once you had started, but his feelings for Scully stood in their way. He could see himself with Diana; married with children. He could be happy with her. After she had been shot he had spent a similar night on her first night out of the hospital as he had last night with Scully. She wasn’t the one he wanted, but if Scully didn’t love him, then, people do settle, don’t they? He takes the tea and toast to Scully.

There is no medical reason for Scully not to be hungry and, as a medical doctor, she knows the importance of eating. This near death experience and the case that had resulted in her near death really shook her. She couldn’t help thinking about mortality and immortality. She can’t stop thinking about a poem she remembers from a college literature class. There is a line in a poem by Eliot. “Do I dare disturb the universe?’

Her universe has been Mulder and the X files the last few years. She has no romance. She is unable to have children. Now Mulder and her are off the X-files. He had once told her she was the most important person in his life and on another occasion that she was his one in five billion, but that was before Diana was back in the picture. She had seen the way he looks at Diana and had heard through the grapevine that he had spent at least one night at her house. If they were having sex, then Mulder must love her and believe she loved him. More of the poem comes back to her:

Politic, cautious, and meticulous;  
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;  
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—  
Almost, at times, the Fool.

She was Mulder’s advisor, confidant and naysayer. No more than an attendant. That was her role in this drama. Dare she disturb her own universe by walking away from Mulder-ask for reassignment? Did she dare disturb her universe by looking honestly at the reasons she stayed with the FBI and as Mulder’s partner? Shouldn’t she take the fact that she had survived, again, to prioritize differently? Yet the thought of disturbing her universe by leaving Mulder made her depressed.

She takes the tea and toast from Mulder. He sits beside her on the bed while she eats and drink. ‘You look sad, Mulder.”

“I have been thinking about “the love song of J Alfred Prufrock.” It's a sad poem.”

“That’s odd. I have been thinking about it as well.”

Scully is done with the toast and tea. Mulder picks up her hand and kisses it. He pushes a stray lock of hair behind her ear. “Scully, I understand now why there are so many songs and poems about unrequited love.”

“Who do you love, Mulder?”

“You know. I told you.”

“Who? When?”

“That time in the hospital. You said ‘oh, brother.”

“You were delirious and on pain medication.”

“I still meant it.”

‘But how about Diana?”

Mulder sighs. He gets off the bed and leans against the wall; his arms and legs crossed. “I guess that’s the thing about unrequited love. The only way to get over it is to find someone who can love you back. Is that what you think I should do?”

Scully fluffs up her pillows, rearranges them, and leans back on them. She looks out the window. “That is not it at all. That is not what I meant at all.”

A knock on the front door interrupts their conversation. They both know it is Scully’s mother. Mulder says he will let her in on his way out. “I will see you when you are ready to come back to work, Scully.”

“Mulder, wait.” She stops him as he is walking out. He turns and look at her. “Will you call me? I mean, every night until I return to work. Will you please call me?”

He nods. Of course he will. She watches him exit her room. He loves me, she thinks. She tries to process it. If she allows herself to fall in love with him everything will change. Does she dare disturb her universe?


	4. Dana and Fox

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Timeframe. Season 6 Arcadia

Mulder is on the couch in a suburb of San Diego. Scully and him are undercover as a married couple, but not under the covers together as he would like; together, in love, contemplating their future. This is the fantasy keeping him awake. What would it be like to play house for real with Dana Scully?. He wonders if Scully ever realizes how hard it is for him, being in love with her, while she thinks of him as a colleague, a brother, a friend, an annoyance. No undercover assignment has ever felt as natural and as frustrating. He puts in hands in his pants and distractedly scratches his balls before he begins to touch his dick. He touches it without intention of it going in an erotic direction; just absentmindedly getting “in touch” with his feelings. The last vision he had of Scully was in that green face mask, blue sleep pants, white cotton shirt, robe, hair back from her face. There is nothing erotic about that image, he thinks, but then realizes he is, nevertheless, responding erotically. He removes his hand, turns over on the couch, and tries to tell himself that in time he will get over her.

He half wakes a couple of hours later realizing he has been dreaming –it was him, not Eddie, about to kiss her on the couch and she had let him. His hand goes back inside his pants. His left hand takes down his pants slightly giving him a chance to freely engage with his right hand. In his mind the couch is the couch in Scully’s apartment and she has removed her shirt. The dream seems so real he can her gasp, “oh, oh”. He speeds up his hand motion. “I’m so sorry.” What? He eyes blink open. She is really here in the room with him, in the same pajamas she had worn to bed, but with the green wiped off. Her face is red, blushing, and she is backing away. DAMN! He realizes he has his cock out of his pants with his hand on it. He quickly removes his hand and pulls \up his pants.

“It's ok. What’s the matter?” He sits up, embarrassed, but ready to pull his gun and fight whatever evil is lurking.

“I couldn’t sleep and thought I would get some ice cream. I just came in to see if you were awake and wanted some. Mulder, I’m so sorry.” She buries her face in her hand.

“It's ok, Scully. It's not like you didn’t know I sometimes…I mean all men sometimes…I mean, I guess, women too sometimes.”

“Shut up, Mulder.” He is actually glad she has stopped him before he rambled on further. “I will leave you to…whatever,” Scully turns around to leave.

“Scully,” she turns back to him. ‘Just one scoop for me.”

By the time she returns with the ice cream, he has gone to the restroom, washed his hands extra well as if he was Lady Macbeth, tried to slick his hair down. She walks in as he is bends over to pick up the remote control. He is wearing light linen pajama bottoms only-no boxers underneath- and the outline of everything he is front side and backside is clear as he walks around straightening the living room; clearing his papers off the coffee table, folding the blanket. He sits down and takes the bowl of ice cream off the table. Scully has already eaten one of her scoops as she watches him. No longer embarrassed and seeing the humor in the situation, her eyes are smiling and she has a sideways smile. “Rob is looking fine!” She sensually licks the ice cream off her spoon and Mulder is reminded of a time in a hotel room with a sausage. “Is Laura rethinking her decision to kick him to the couch?” They laugh, comfortable again with each other, and Mulder turns on the television, finds a late night talk show, and they finish their ice cream in. silence.

  
It is a Friday afternoon. The case is over. Mulder is in the lobby of a very fancy San Diego hotel listening to Scully’s end of the conversation with the administrative assistant from the FBI. Scully had made arrangements for her to take a flight out Sunday night so she could spend the week-end in San Diego, visiting her brother and his family she said, but as Mulder looks at the hotel she has booked for herself he wonders how much times she is really planning on seeing her brother. The administrative assistant had changed both Mulder’s and her flights and now flights out were booked- none available.. Scully hangs up the phone with an exasperated expression on her face.

“She said she assumed if I was staying the week-end so were you.”

“We are kind of tied at the hip. We do everything together.” Mulder laughs when Scully rolls her eyes.

“They will reimburse you standard FBI rate for hotel cost and I will cover the rest if you want to stay here.”

“I can’t just shack up with you?” Scully face becomes more exasperated at Mulder’s comment. “Joking, Scully. I can find somewhere- don’t worry.”

“No, no I want you to stay here. I will go get you a room- give me your ID.” Scully hurries away feeling guilty that her plans screwed up Mulder’s plans; although she knows rationally it's an administrative error not hers. As Mulder tries to read her body language and facial expression he misunderstands her annoyance. When she returns with his key, he tries to reassure her.

“Look, Scully, I can stay out of your hair. I can give you space. I know you had plans and, hey, I can find ways to occupy myself. Please don’t think I’m going to be bothering you.” Scully hands him her additional room key and keeps one of his as is their habit when traveling together; in case of emergencies. She looks at him quizzically. “I know we just lived together for a few days and you’re probably sick of me. Thanks for the room.”

Scully looks after him shaking her head. Why did he think she wanted him to stay here? She had thought it would be nice to spend some leisure time together. Her exasperation level rose- had he actually just ditched her again?

  
Scully returns to the hotel after 10 pm. Visits with her brother and his family always seem more an obligation than anything else. She had told him she was the only available for the evening. Mulder was here…and then she had heard her brother’s opinion on Mulder’s. Scully is tired. She stops in the hotel bar to order a bottle for the room. She looks across the bar and sees Mulder definitely enjoying herself.

She sits at the bar alone and orders a Manhattan. She asks the bartender- is it country night? The bartender says no, but the ladies and the gentleman had asked him to put country on the stereo. This is not a dance bar. Mulder and the three women, all in their early twenties, blonde and leggy, have pushed the tables in the otherwise empty bar aside. Mulder is in front of the line with his back to Scully. He is wearing tight jeans. The ladies in back of him are not familiar with country dancing and he is showing them, but the ladies are clearly more focused on his behind. He comes around to each of them one at a time and standing closely behind them with his arms around them, helps them learn the moves. Scully notices the coy smiles on each lady’s face as they look in Mulder’s face and leans their body closer to him. She hears one of them say, “like this, Fox?” as she moves her behind into his crotch. Scully thinks how much she would like to wipe the smiles off of each of their smug faces. She nurses her one drink while the bartender takes beers and shots to Mulder and the ladies.

Finally, a cab driver comes in- hollers out a name- and the group turns. Mulder sees Scully. The ladies beg Mulder to come with them to a bar across town. Mulder thanks them, but says no. Each lady reaches up one by one to say goodbye to Mulder with a kiss on the mouth. Mulder responds willingly with hands squeezing the ass of each one. The ladies leave and Mulder rubs his thumb over his lips as his eyes follow them out the door. As they get to the door, they turn, all of them, and say in unison, “bye, foxy Fox.” Mulder waves, crosses to the bar, and offers to buy Scully a drink.

Scully accepts the drink, but barely glances or talks to him. He asks how her brother was. She shrugs. He moves closer to her and says softly, “Scully, you don’t really have any right to be jealous.” She looks at him with the fury in her eyes he finds so sexy. “I mean, do you?”

“How come you let everyone else call you Fox but me?” She surprises Mulder with the question. He thought she would be more jealous of the kisses.

“Those women don’t mean anything, Scully. I was just fooling around. Sometimes having an uncommon first name- women, you know a type of woman, responds to that. What should I do- introduce myself as Agent Mulder?”

“Diana calls you Fox. Phoebe called you Fox. Your mother, my mother-calls you Fox. Why can’t I call you Fox?”

“I think, when I told you to call me Mulder, I was already attracted to you. I thought it would be a way to keep professional boundaries between us by calling each other by our last names.”

“Well, that’s been effective,” Scully says with an ironic tone and slams the rest of her drink.

“I obviously didn’t know how much we would grow to mean to each other, but now I like us- Mulder and Scully- those names go together so well that even the the admin at the FBI think of us as one single entity.” Mulder’s voice gets husky at the end of the sentence; full of emotion at the thought of their being one.

“But now we’re here without a case and we’re not one, obviously. So for this week-end can we at least call each other Dana and Fox? I would like to see what that feels like.”

Mulder looks at her. He is hopelessly in love, but he does not imagine she is without faults. One of her faults is not recognizing the pain he is in due specifically to how much he does love her.

“Sure, Dana, “ he says it in a sarcastic manner. “Should we see each other this week-end, meet in the elevator or accidentally run into each other in the bar while having a late night drink- then Fox and Dana it is.” He finishes his drink and leaves the bar.   
Saturday morning, Scully tries to call Mulder. It goes straight to voice mail. She lingers in the lobby; spends so much time in the gift shop she feels compelled to buy something. She is loitering. She is intentionally putting herself in a position to run into Mulder- no, Fox, because she is going to call him Fox, she tells herself. There is no sign of him.

Shortly after noon Scully does a double take to make sure the two leggy blondes walking by her in bathing suits are not the same women as last night. No. It is two different blonde, leggy women in their early twenties who are talking about the handsome man with the dry wit by the swimming pool. Handsome, funny, and the way he looks in that red speedo. Those red speedos are the talk of the FBI among those women who swim at the Quantico pool Scully goes up stairs. She has brought two bathing suits on this trip because one she was afraid she would be too chicken to wear. She puts it on now. It is a one piece black bathing suit with a cleavage cut to the belly button. In the back it has a similar cut down to her tail bone.

Mulder has just gotten out of the pool and is toweling off when he sees Scully. He quickly drops the towel so it covers his immediate erection. The black bathing suit, the red hair, her skin is pale, of course, but the portion visible between her breasts to her belly button is porcelain. She walks over to him, takes the towel from him, hands him sun block, turns around and raises her hair so her back is exposed.. He massages the lotion into her back, down to the small of the back. He is breathing loudly enough for her to hear him. She turns and looks up at him. She tries to take the sun block from him and he pulls it back. He steps back, pours the lotion into his left hand, drops the lotion on a nearby chaise, closes his hands so lotion is now on both hands. He starts with his hands on either side of Scully’s petite neck. His hands seem so large on her body as he rubs down the middle of her chest to her belly button. He is is inches from being able to touch her most private area. He look around to make sure no one is looking and then with his left hand still on her stomach he grabs her hand with his right hand and places it firmly on his bulge. He presses her hand against him hard and breathes in quickly with the sensation. He believes he could cry, burst into tears as he had before in front of her. Why does he find it so easy to cry in front of her? Neither has spoken. Time seems to have stopped. She stands on her tip toes, reaches up with her other hand to pull his head down to hers, she whispers in his ear, “Come up to my room.”

He is looking in her eyes. His treasure chest, prize, pot of gold-use whatever metaphor you want- God, she is here looking up at him, eager to give herself to him. What will you have to pay, Mulder? He urges himself to consider the cost. An hour or two from now when she is smiling and contented, but no more willing to commit to him than she is now, how will he survive that rejection? He doesn’t want her for an hour or two. He wants her for forever. “I can’t.” He lets her hand free from his loin, removes his hand from her stomach, stands up straight and walks away.

Scully is furious. She goes to her room and changes before going straight to Mulder’s room. When Mulder doesn’t answer her knock, she lets herself in with the spare key. She hears the shower running. She pours herself a glass of water and tries to calm down. God damn tease. He had grabbed her hand and pulled it to his…it was large, both length and width, to her touch. His hand on her stomach. Inches lower…Damn him. Just teasing her.

Mulder gets out of the shower, grabs a towel and steps out from the restroom not expecting anyone to be there. Once again he lowers the towel to cover his groin. “Scully, what the hell are you doing?” He steps back into the restroom and walks out in a long, dark cotton robe, oversized which he ties around the waist.

“We need to talk about this, Fox.” She says his name with a certain sweetness. “There is obviously a physical attraction between us.”

Mulder looks at her incredulously. He shrugs. “I’ve barely noticed.”

“It's not funny, Fox.”she says his name in that same way again.

“Scully, can we just use last names?”

“Why are you so angry at me? Are you actually angry at me because I want to fuck you? You want to fuck me too. At least a part of you does.”

“I’m sorry, Scully. None of this is your fault. I’m sorry. I’m frustrated. It's hard to be the one in love with the girl who doesn’t love you back.”

“How do you know what I feel or don’t feel?”

Mulder looks at her confused.

“Mulder, you are the last person I would ever expect to be so conventional. Why do we need declarations of love to have sex?”

Mulder shakes his head. Hasn’t he told her this before? “It's not morality, Scully. I think a lot of it has to do with my family dynamics. It was odd after Samantha…wasn’t there. I’ve been lonely since I was twelve. I don’t know, but when I give my body, my heart follows. In this case you already have my heart. Its so hard to explain.”

“Would you try, Mulder?”  
“I love you. When we are working I can put that aside. I can focus on the work. I’m always just so fortunate to have you there. It means everything, but, to be with you without a case? I want to reach out and touch you. Even in Arcadia, pretending to be married to you was a type of sweet torture. To know that I can’t have a life with you outside of work. It would be even worse if we had sex. To you it would just be another encounter, but for me…”

“Every time we talk about sex, you call me a slut.” She wouldn’t let him interrupt. “I very seldom have casual sex, Mulder, and, maybe at one time it might have been casual, but not now. Mulder, most people date, they get to know each other, they like one another, they take it to the next level to have sex and then they make a commitment, if they are compatible in every way..”

“I’m not most people.” They sit quietly for a little while. “Scully, do you think we don’t know each other well enough or are you actually afraid we’re not sexually compatible?”

Scully laughs. Over the last few years they have developed such communication in their looks and glances that many fellow agents thought they were telepathetically communicating. Was there anyone who knew her better than Mulder? And she had no fears that they could satisfy one another sexually. “Mulder, I care deeply about…”

‘OH, CHRIST, MOTHER OF GOD-DON’T GIVE ME THE I LOVE YOU LIKE A BROTHER SPEECH. YOU LOVE ME LIKE A BROTHER YOU WANT TO FUCK?”

Scully responds to Mulder’s yelling with calm. “Mulder you are a part of me. My other half. My other self.”

Mulder is sitting on his bed breathing in shallowly. What exactly is she saying?

“The question isn’t whether or not I love you, as I see it. It's whether or not I can commit to a life with you- the life always in danger, always seeking truth, always running to or from something…and not just for today or the next five years, but for every moment of our lives for the rest of our lives.”

“You know the man I am, Scully. I think if you loved me, you wouldn’t be questioning whether or not you could commit.”

“I know Agent Mulder, I know Scully’s Mulder, but I don’t know Fox. I don’t know the man who was flirting with those women last night. I don’t know who you are when…” It is Scully turn to have a hard time explaining. ‘Who are we when we are not Mulder and Scully together? Because if we think we can spend a life together than, at some point, we need to be Fox and Dana. Could we try for a while to see about a balance? Could we try to spend time together when we are not working and be Fox and Dana? If you love me as you say you do and that's what I need to make the decision about whether or not I can commit to you, will you try it to see?”

Mulder doesn’t say anything. In fact he stays in one position thinking long after Scully leaves. The next morning he goes down to the lobby. Scully is drinking coffee and reading the newspaper.

“Good morning, Dana.” Their eyes meet. She nods her head. “How are you thinking of spending the remainder of your time in California?”

“Well, Fox,” she says his name softly. “I thought I would go for a walk on the beach. Would you like to come?” He smiles and, as they leave the hotel for a walk, grabs onto her hand. He understands . She isn’t rejecting his love. She isn’t saying never. She is saying- meet me in the middle and I will try to love you back. No promises, but she will try.


	5. Christmas Apart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Timeframe: Season 7 Before Millenium

Mulder is dreaming. He knows he is dreaming because he can see himself and Scully as if on high looking down. They both look older. It is at least 10 years in the future- maybe more. They are living together. He knows that somehow. They have been-are -a couple. They share a home and there is a picture of an infant with a Scully closer to the age they are now framed on a mantle, but the boy does not seem to be present in the dream or in the house. Did they have a son? What happened to him? Scully is packing a bag and crying. The older him in his dream is leaning against a wall; arms and legs crossed in front of him.

“Remember, this is your choice not mine, “ the older Mulder says quietly. His tone is neither angry nor sad. It is factual. Stating established facts which cannot be questioned.

“I just wish you could put it all behind you and live a normal life, Mulder.”

“You’ve said that to me before, Scully, and I told you this is who I was…who I am. You decided to commit to me anyway because you loved me. So what has changed?” “I’m tired. I never wanted a life of perpetual truth seeking. I wanted you and a normal life.”

“Then you shouldn’t have committed. There is no me and a normal life. There is either me or a normal life.”

Mulder wakes. He looks at the clock. 11 a.m. Well, he had almost managed to sleep through the morning. “Merry Fucking Christmas to me.”

He cannot help but think about last Christmas. He had told his mother, as he had this year, that he had to work. Last year he asked Scully to meet him at a haunted house on Christmas Eve.. It’s Christmas morning last year that haunts him this Christmas morning; Scully knocking on the door in the early hours, their exchange of gifts, giggling together, before she left to her family. It had been a brief couple of hours, but was the happiest Christmas morning of his adult life.

He tries to piece it together. What has happened between their trip to California and now which has ended with him alone on Christmas morning?

They came back with their plan to spend leisure Dana and Fox time together. They had. She had cooked him dinner in her apartment. He had taken her to play frisbee golf in the park. They went to museums and art galleries. She had dragged him for a pedicure one Saturday at a salon. Wonderful leisure hours. Over time, though, it became confusing. Were they a couple; albeit platonic? Were they fucking –oh, sorry, non-fucking-girlfriends? Was she in love with him? Any type of definitional discussion left them both frustrated and exhausted.

Then there was the day he walked into his next door apartment to see her sitting on a bed with a stranger. Was she really about to have sex with that man, that writer, who had gotten into her head? She had almost died –again. But the writer who seems to know her so well had suggested she was in love with him, Mulder.

While he ponders these memories, Mulder has gotten up, made coffee and now, in the shower, allows himself, as a special Christmas treat to himself, to remember his favorite memory of last year. They are on a baseball field. The kid shagging balls is long gone, but he hasn’t moved. His arms around Scully and her leaning back against him. He smells her hair, kisses her neck. The bat longed ago dropped to the ground, it is no longer about the game, but about them and he has stood for half an hour not talking- just holding her. Finally she whispers so softly he has to bend down to hear her “I can feel how much you want me, Fox.” She presses her behind into his groin. He had chuckled. “I always want you, Dana. I have never wanted a woman so much. I thought I had been in love before, but not like this.” She doesn’t say anything. She still can’t say the words to him and, as the night air became cooler, she simply turned, hugged him tight and walked away.

It was a week later –at her apartment- that she had asked him if he had ever thought about leaving the X files behind now that the conspiracy had been uncovered and most of the syndicate were dead. She had said that line she had repeated in his dreams. ‘I just wish you could put it all behind you and live a normal life, Mulder.” He had said to her just what he said in his dreams. “It's either me or a normal life, Scully. You can’t have both.” When she hadn’t responded, it was his turn to wordlessly walk away. Then, there was no more Fox and Dana leisure time for a while.

Then, another life changing catastrophe, the artifacts found in Africa, his illness, her finding him so close to death, Diana’s death. Without Dana in his leisure hours he had spent time with Diana again. That is the thing about unrequited love-the only way to get over it is to find someone who could love you back. He remembers the night he had been so sick, collapsing in the stairwell of an university, and had called Diana. Even as Diana had taken him home and helped him to bed, he had been irrationally angry at Scully. If she had loved him, if she could believe in him, if she wasn’t always trying to prove him wrong…she had called him, pressed him about who had answered the phones and he had told her to prove him wrong. If he had died, that would have been the last thing he said to her.

He had fallen asleep and woke up with Diana’s thoughts in his mind. She was nude, lying with her arms around his back as she used to do when they were really together. He knew now she loved him, but he knew all her other truths and everything she had lied to him about as well. His brain working so fast, his sanity slipping away, he had begged her to call Scully. Scully-he had to talk to her one last time before he slipped away…Sccuully! Neighbors had heard his screams and had called the police and he ended up in the psyche unit. Reading minds was the most horrendous thing he had ever experienced, but there was one blessing. The one time Scully had been allowed to see him. He knew then. She loved him as deeply as he loved her and she was afraid; afraid in the moment but equally afraid of loving him.

Mulder thinks he should call his mother to wish her a happy Christmas. He should find something to eat. It's mid afternoon now. He sits in the dark instead. He had never told Scully the details of his dreams –that he had been married to Diana with children and a simple life. Why Diana and not Scully? Because Scully would never have let him settled for that bullshit. Even in his dream life he was settling for Diana. The irony of it was that Scully wanted a normal life with him, but wanted him to be true to himself which would mean never having a normal life.

Mulder calls his mother. He talks to her less and less these days, but it is Christmas. He puts the phone down after a few minutes thinking well –that’s it, my Christmas.

A couple of weeks ago he had high hopes for this Christmas. After his near death experience and Diana’s death, he had told himself he would never settle. It was Scully or no one. They went back, each grateful it seemed, to leisure time Dana and Fox. He now knew she loved him, so the question was could she commit to him knowing he could never commit to a normal life. Would she ever be able to tell him she loved him?

Two weeks ago, walking back from the park hand in hand, he suggested they get away for the Christmas holiday.

“We could go to Vermont to a ski lodge, or Florida or back to California. Even Hawaii, Dana. Christmas in swimming gear- do you still have that black bathing suit?”

“I always spend Christmas with my family, Fox. Bill is coming in. I was hoping you would come with me this year for Christmas dinner.”

“Bill hates me.”

“There’s always some drama in families, Fox, but the benefits outweigh the drama.”

Mulder thought about his mother checking him out of the hospital to that cigarette smoking bastard, his father and his father’s willingness to risk Mulder’s life. Sometimes the family drama was so intense that the benefits did not make up for it.

“Will we be going as a couple, Dana? Are you ready to announce to your family that we are…whatever we are?”

“I could just tell them you don’t have anywhere else to be.”

“Your loser partner being dragged along. Bill will love that.”

‘Probably more than thinking we are…moving towards a romance.”

Mulder stopped walking and faced Scully. “I want to be alone with you. Show you that we can have interludes of normalcy even why involved in our common quest for the truth. I want to kiss you under the mistletoe and give you a gift right at midnight.”

“For me a normal life is Christmas with my family. Besides you make it sounds like we would have this romantic week-end. Are you willing to…share a bed?”

“Can you commit?”

Scully looked away from him. “So I would be just your loser partner being dragged along because he has no place better to go. You can’t see us as a couple.”

“Fox, this mistletoe you fantasizing about. Would you kiss me on the mouth? You know after all this time you still haven't. Do you think the world would end if you kissed me on the mouth?” Scully was angry, sad, frustrated and hurt at the same time. It was making her impatient with Mulder. Her eyes were flashing and she had tossed her hair back as she talked repeatedly.

“I can’t see what possible difference it would make at this juncture of our relationship if I kissed you on the mouth or not.” Mulder’s tone was that cold, aloof tone he used to hide his true feelings. He looked at her through half closed eyes.

And that was the end of the conversation. There had been no more Dana and Fox leisure time since. Before Christmas break, in their office, they had awkwardly said goodbye and that they would see each other in the New Year. Mulder rummages through the refrigerator and finds a beer and left over pizza. “Merry Fucking Christmas to me.”

It is December 29. Scully and her mother have returned from taking Bill and his family to the airport. Scully has agreed to spend the night with her mother so her mother wouldn’t be so suddenly alone after a house full of grandchildren and family. Scully had spent the night Christmas Eve and Christmas night, but had left at noon on the 26th and hadn’t came back until today. A couple of times Bill had made disparaging remarks about Mulder and, of course, she had defended Mulder. She would always defend Mulder, but she had been fatigued with the effort. She had spent two and a half frustrating days organizing her closets and preparing her receipts for taxes and not, absolutely not, expecting her phone to ring.

She sits now on her mother’s couch looking at the tree. If her father was alive, they would spend tomorrow taking it down, but, now, her mother always kept it up through New Years. Margaret Scully has a cup of tea in her hand to give to her daughter, but has stopped in the doorway. Her daughter has looked so sad this holiday season.

“How’s Fox, dear?” Margaret hands her daughter the tea.   
“I don’t know, Mom. I haven’t seen him.”

“Is he in town?”

“As far as I know.”

“And you haven’t spent any time with him the last couple of days? I thought that’s why you haven’t been around.”

“No, Mom. We’re off duty and so I haven’t seen him. I just had other things to do.”

Margaret is well aware that in the last few months Fox and Dana have been spending leisure time together. She had even seen them once at an art museum when she went out one Saturday with a girlfriend. Also the beautician at the salon her and Dana went to had told her Dana brought in a very handsome, tall man for a pedicure. “What did he do for Christmas? You know I am very fond of him. It is so clear how much he cares for you.”

“Mom, I invited him over here. He didn’t want to come. He probably spent it alone or with some male friends.”

“Dana, you have got to learn to compromise.” Margaret’s tone was firm with her daughter and Scully looked up surprised. “You left him alone for Christmas. That poor boy.”

“Mom, did you not want me to spend Christmas with you?”

‘Of course, but children grow up and have their own life. Did you think about spending some time with him on Christmas Eve, maybe having dinner with him, and then coming here Christmas morning or leaving here Christmas morning to take him over some cookies? Maybe watch a Christmas movie with him? We’re all in the same town. Why not split your Christmas half with us and half with him?”

Margaret took the tea cups into the kitchen. Scully sat now dumbfounded by what was such a common sense approach to having conflicting loyalties over a holiday season. Why was it all or nothing, such a struggle with them even over the easy stuff? Why were two intelligent people so stupid and handling this relationship stuff so poorly?

Sex, Scully thought. This goddamn stubbornness of Mulder’s about sex was driving them both crazy. She has never wanted a man more. She had wanted him since the day they met, but now, with how close they were, knowing he loved her, sex has become this giant thing that was between them always. There were nights when they were on the phone and just the sound of his voice would lead her to touch herself. There were times when standing beside him, she couldn’t concentrate on what he was saying because he looked- he was lean, slender even, but strong with perfect biceps. How could she possibly have problem solved rationally that day walking home from the park? He had asked about her bathing suit and talked about kissing her. She suddenly remembered his hands on her body and was distracted by his lips. Damn, if she could just have sex with him one time, then she could think rationally about him and whether or not she wanted a life with him. How could she possibly make such an important decision as distracted as she was with just wanting him?

“Dana, are you ok? Your phone’s ringing.”

Dana takes the phone out of her purse. Skinner. A few minutes later, off the phone, Scully says “Mom, I won’t be able to spend New Years with you. I’m being recalled to work tomorrow for an emergency case.”

“I understand, dear.” Margaret sees the light back in her daughter’s eyes. Mulder must be on the case as well. She wonders when these two kids will realize the true nature of their relationship. 


	6. New Year's Together

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Timeframe: Season 7 After Millenium. Graphic sexual activity.

New Year’s Day 2000, 3:30 a.m. Scully arrives home. Her thoughts alternate between zombies and Armageddon. She knows that the four Angels of the Apocalypse will not be zombies raised from the dead. Yet, she has no scientific explanation for having been attacked by a man who was living, although she was sure he had been dead, or from shooting and killing a zombie which was about to kill Mulder. What really worries her is that she does not seem to be as upset about the events as she usually is. When zombies become routine..

She has felt a little like the walking dead herself this entire holiday season. Over Christmas she pretended to be jolly while desperately missing Mulder. Then, grateful for being called into work just so she could see Mulder, Mulder and her were cold and distant-awkward with each other. Then, on top of that, the odd case! Possibility of the world ending! Zombies! She knows she had performed competently, admirably even-yet again saving Mulder from death. Still, it was hard to care even about the end of the world if Mulder and her were emotionally distant.

Worst type of stereotypical female, Scully scolds herself, as if the man in your life is all that matters. When he had kissed her and said “the world didn’t end, Scully” –throwing her words back at her- she had been annoyed. She wanted to chide him. No the world didn’t end; couples kiss all the time. Then, she realized, he was being literal. Armageddon had not occurred. Only then, she was happy. They had saved the world and he had kissed her. As if in the end of a movie. Hero and heroine walking off with his arm around her shoulder.

She had taken him to his apartment. There was no sign of the holiday season. Not a tree. Not a decoration. There were movies on the table; the type of movies he liked in private. He looked sheepish and explained they were the lone gunmen’s Christmas gift to him. She had asked him, with his right arm in a sling, immobilized for at length 48 hours, how he was going to take care of those particular needs. He had smirked, “always wanted to learn to bat left handed.” Damn him. Damn him for being so able to take care of those needs independently. She didn’t have the same skills at that as he had.

She had warned him about the prescribed pain medication. It was a surprisingly high dosage. He had told her he wouldn’t operate heavy machinery. She had stared at him until he unloaded his gun and let her lock it away. Then they had awkwardly said goodbye.

Her phone rings. Scully smiles realizing it was just what she was hoping. When they are getting along well, Mulder often times out how long it takes her to reach her apartment after leaving his and calls a few minutes after she arrives She answers: Scully.

It is Mulder. He is crying, gasping for breathe, in clear distress. “Mulder, what is wrong?” “Blood, Scully, so much blood.” “I’m calling an ambulance.” “No,” his voice had that definitive no nonsense tone despite the pain and fear mixed in. “You come, Scully, bring medical bag”. He hung up.

Despite not being a practicing physician, Scully had put together a medical bag at Mulder’s insistence, because you never knew…she grabs it now and speeds as quickly as she could to Mulder’s. She lets herself in with her key while simultaneously calling his name. “Here, Scully,” he calls from the restroom.

Mulder is standing in the restroom. He is nude, holding a blood soaked towel to his loin area. His pants and underpants are piled nearby with blood on them. Mulder’s eyes are wide. He is as scared as she has ever seen him. She bends down asking, “what happened?”

“My zipper got caught in boxers. I couldn’t get them off with just my left hand so I got some scissors. Then, there was all this blood.”

Scully has put on gloves, removed the towel and has begun to wipe away the blood to locate the wound. There is a fairly deep wound on the right upper thigh. He is lucky he didn’t hit a main artery. She presses gauze to it while she searches for other wounds.

“Scully, my balls, my dick.” Mulder is sobbing.

“Where do they hurt?”Scully is continuing to look but cannot see any other wound.

“They don’t hurt, I took two of those pain pills- I can’t feel much, but there was so much blood.” He look down at Scully and reaches his left hand to his groin area gingerly feeling first his penis and then balls. Scully bites her tongue from telling him the prescription was for one pain pill and they were especially strong. She realizes that he has over reacted because of the location of the injury and the amount of blood. She struggles not to laugh. “You were circumcised weren’t you?” “Its not fucking funny.”

The gauze Scully is holding on his thigh is blood soaked. “You need stitches.” “I can’t go the hospital with this. Its so humiliating.” “It would be worse if I was putting your severed penis on ice.” Mulder shudders involuntarily. Scully puts another gauze over his wound. “Hold this, Mulder. I need to go prepare your bed.”

She is gone for a few minutes. He holds the gauze on his right thigh with his left hand. His right arm is still in a sling. He looks, as best he can, at his penis –reassuring himself he is all still there.

Scully returns. With his left arm around her shoulders and her holding his right leg, he hops into the bedroom. She is much smaller than he is and it is slow going. He teeters over her unsteadily. Scully has put towels at the edge of the bed to soak up blood and has towels by the side of the bed should she need them. She has brought in a stand up lamp from the living room and has angled it to shine brightly on the edge of the bed.

“You will have to lie with some of your ass off the bed so I can kneel on the floor and be at the right angle to stitch the wound.” Mulder thinks it is a good thing he no longer has a water bed. He lies on the bed with some of his ass hanging off the bed. Scully positions his leg and begins to clean and sanitize the wound. When Mulder lifts his head slightly to look at the end of the bed he can only see the top of her head from where she is kneeling. Then suddenly she rises on her knees and her eyes peak over his groin. “Mulder, I don’t have anything to numb the area.”. He nods. “I took those pain pills.” “Its still going to hurt.” Scully lowers herself back down and begins to stitch. As painful as it is, Mulder is distracted by the view of Scully’s eyes periodically popping up over his groin as she makes sure he is ok, warns him it will leave a scar, asks him questions, responds to his questions. About the sixth time her head bobs up and down over his groin area, he thinks that this is the most absurd situation they have ever been in.

Her eyes pop up again. “I’m done. You will be ok.” He nods and reclines his head back. The medication wearing off, he can’t decide if his arm or thigh hurts worse. After a few minutes, he becomes nervous. “Scully?” Her eyes pop back up. “My penis and balls-you’re sure they’re ok?” “They are fine, Mulder.” He nods again and reclines his head on the bed. A few more minutes pass. “Scully?” Her eyes pop up. “What are you doing?” “Mulder, for the record, you are fine and unless something else happens, I am taking off my doctor and partner hat. Ok, Fox?” He nods and reclines again on the bed. A few minutes go by. “Dana?” Her eyes pop up again. “What the Hell are you doing down there?” “Enjoying the view.”

Their eyes meet. Her eyes are twinkling and he is sure she is smiling if he could see her mouth over his penis. “Stop that,” he says “help me up.” He holds out his left arm. Dana stands and moves towards him. She helps him stand and moves him towards the head of the bed. She helps him climb in and puts pillows in back of his right shoulder to support him. She puts a pillow under his right knee. “Hand me the sheet and blanket, Dana.” She shakes her head. “What possible advantage is there to me in doing that?” She climbs into the bed beside him on the left side. She presses her lips against him. He kisses her back. His mouth opens. She tilts her head and presses her tongue against him. They kiss slowly, exploring each other’s mouth. She pulls away and he pulls her body close with his left arm. “I have missed you so much the last week. It was torture.” She sees the loneliness in his eyes and hears her mother’s voice – “you left him alone on Christmas?”

“I was so stupid, Fox.”

“Dana, remember that time with the bee? I think sub-consciously I was afraid you would collapse on me if I tried to kiss you.”

“But the world didn’t end and I didn’t collapse.”

“And it turns out kissing you is quite nice.” Mulder kisses her again repeatedly. He rises slightly to place more pressure on her lips. His hand finds the wound on her neck from her encounter with a zombie. He traces the wound with his fingers. “Are you ok?” Scully nods.

“Fucking zombies. I sat on that basement floor with zombies surrounding me and only a small bit of salt to protect me. Zombies, Dana! Remember how much we made fun of that movie we watched filming, the Lazarus Bowl, and the zombie scene?”

“These zombies were not interested in tofurkey.” Scully laughs. She kisses Mulder again and reaches for his penis. Her fingers softly rubs him. He pulls away. Looking deep in her eyes, he says, “I can’t. As hard as the past week has been..” His voice is husky and deep. “Dana, that part of me I’ve kept in reserve to see if you could commit, that saved me last week. I wouldn’t have survived otherwise.”

Scully swallows and looks away overwhelmed by his emotions. He can fight off zombies, but doesn’t believe he has the strength to survive her leaving him. “Fox, let me take care of your needs. I won’t expect anything back from you. It will just be me taking care of you.” She reaches for his penis again. With her touch he breathes in deep, but shakes his head. “Its not right.”

She grasps firmer. “Our President says what I want to do to you is not sex. It doesn’t count.”

Mulder’s head is back and his eyes are closed. “We’ll have a new President in a few days and I don’t think he will agree.”

“Then we better do it now before the rules changed. Consider it a New Year’s gift.”

Mulder opens his eyes. Scully’s hand continues to massage him but she is looking into his eyes for permission. “I know women don’t enjoy…”

“Fox, you are not most men and I am not most women. I need to do this. I need to feel alive. I need to connect with you in a different way.” Her eyes beg him. He feels, in his weakened state physically and emotionally, that his resolve is fading. He stares at her mouth. “Please, let me.”

Seeing the permission in his eyes, she moves down to the area of his body she had previously been admiring. She had been with longer men who were skinny and men with more width who were shorter. Fully erected, he is the perfect combination of 10 inches length and six inches round. He is pink and healthy. She has never seen a man more beautiful. She, in fact, does enjoy giving a man oral sex. It puts her in control. It makes her in charge of his pleasure. She loves the thrill of hearing the man gasps in orgasm and knowing it is her mouth that plays his instrument. Admittedly, it feels like such an intimate act, that she has performed it only on two other men and only after they had actual penetrative sex several times. This would be the first time she had ever performed this act on anyone without previous intimacy. She puts her hand under his left buttocks and squeezes. He is lean but his ass is somehow plump- as if whatever small amount of fat was in his body went immediately to his rear to wait until needed. Her tongue licks his balls. He tastes of salt.

She remembers the hotel room in Maine and her play with the sausage on a stick. How naïve she had been to think that any sexual action with him could be casual or that they would have any type of normal progression to their romance. Her tongue presses on the base of his already enlarged cock and moves on purposefully to the tip. She repeats this action until she knows he could not be more inflamed. She then grabs his penis with her hand, moves her lips to first one ball and then the other while she strokes his penis. She doesn’t exactly lick or kiss his balls. Her lips, slightly open, are simply softly moving over them as a counterpoint to the hard grasp and stroke of her hand. She hears Fox issue forth a low guttural moan. She returns her tongue to the base and back up to the tip. This time as her mouth reaches the tip, she takes just the very tip in her mouth. She is careful not to have her tongue touch the tip and not to move her mouth. She holds him in her mouth. She feels his hips start to flex, willing her to not leave him in suspense. Again holding his cock in her hand, she slowly purses her lips forcing the tip out of her mouth until her lips are only around the meatus, the opening, the hole. Her tongue flicks out to lick it and then she sucks-putting pressure directly on this, the most sensitive part of his penis, for just a second. His hips flexes and his hands grip the sheets. He is impervious to any pain in his shoulder or thigh. This is the most exquisite of torture. He opens his eyes to see Scully holding his cock, looking directly at his face and smiling. Jesus, she is too beautiful to look at. He closes his eyes. She take his penis fully in her mouth now, moving it up and down, the ridge against her tongue. She can hear his breathing interspersed with moans. She feels the pulsation. She releases him. She straddles him to give herself more leverage. She pushes her tongue to the roof of her mouth and takes him so he is pressing against the underside of her tongue. It feels to him as if she is taking him more deeply into her throat, but it is only a trick of physiology she has learned. Being a doctor has its advantages. It keeps her gag reflexes down and gives him a fuller experience. She grabs his left butt cheek again and squeezes. Fox starts the noise she so wanted to hear. He is quickly breathing and saying under his breathe- oh, oh, oh. With her tongue back in its normal place she takes him as fully as she can in a few rapid movements. As he screams, oh and his precious fluid emerges, she finishes him off with one hand while reaching for one of the towels she had left on the bed with the other and expertly lays it on his stomach to absorb whatever she can’t swallows. Then she puts her mouth back on his penis to suck one last time as Fox’s body quivers and his moans subsides.

She looks up at his face, meets his eyes. He mouths the word thank you and lies his head down. He is exhausted, happy, but his shoulder is starting to pound. Scully goes to the restroom. She has forgotten about Mulder’s bloody clothes on the ground and the blood spots on the tile. She brushes her teeth with Mulder’s toothbrush, rinses her face with water. She looks in the mirror and tries to pat down her hair. Looking under the bathroom sink she finds cleaning supplies and cleans up the blood spots. Picking up his clothes, she looks at his boxers, throws them in the trash. She runs cold water into the bathtub and drops his pants in them to soak. Maybe the blood will come out.

She imagines that Mulder has fallen asleep and walks out quietly. He has managed to get up, kind of half way made the bed. He is sitting up waiting with the sheets and blankets pulled around him. She notices a pair of yellow pajama pants lying on the floor. She picks them up and looks at him.

“I think I’m destined to be pantless today. I couldn’t figure out how to put them on with just one hand.” Scully smiles, fold them and puts them on top of his dresser. “Come here, Dana.”

She goes to the left side of the bed and sits on top of the blanket beside him. They are leaning against the headboard, side by side, their shoulders touching, their bodies stretched out on the bed in front of them. They turn their heads so they are looking at each other. “You are amazing,” he says softly and shyly; unsure of how to act. She smiles. “I feel so much closer to you now.” She lays her head on his shoulder.

“Do you want your gift now?” Scully looks at him. “Fox I said you didn’t have to.” “It's in the top drawer of my dresser.” Scully opens the drawer and finds a long rectangular white box with a ribbon on it. She brings it back to the bed and sits in the same position. “You got me a gift?” “Of course.” Scully smiles. The dead alive feeling she had earlier has disappeared. At this moment she is alive and hopeful of the future. Could this be jewelry? She holds it up and shakes it. “Open it, Dana.”

She pulls off the ribbon and opens the box. She smiles, but looks confused. She pulls out a plastic, very cheap, child’s bracelet with charms on it. She looks at Mulder. “Take a look at the charms.” Inspecting closely she finds five charms: a spaceship, vampire, ghost, zombie, and howling wolf. “Put it on.” It doesn’t have a clasp and is made for a child, but Scully has petite wrists and slips it on.. “I got it at one of those arcade places where you whack a mole and other assorted games for tickets you turn in for a prize.” Scully raises her eyebrows at him. “Don’t scoff, Dana, it took me almost a full paycheck and hours of playing to get that bracelet and charms. Turns out I am not that good at whacking moles.” Scully laughs. His gifts are always so interesting.

With Mulder left hand he touches the bracelet on her wrist and plays with the charms. He is very serious now. “Someday you will meet the one, Dana. He will be normal and will take you away from me, the X-files, maybe the FBI. You’ll go back to medicine, live in the country, adopt a half dozen kids.” He is describing her dream future, but it sounds somewhat empty to her without Mulder in it. “I imagine a future New Years Eve where you are looking through your jewelry box for the perfect jewels to wear with the perfect dress. You come across this bracelet and it makes you smile, reminding you of all our adventures. You think of your eccentric partner,” he pauses briefly “and friend who despite all his oddities loved you…” Mulder breathes deeply not knowing what tense to use about the future. “Loves you…” His voice becomes very husky, deep throated, the sound of syrup pouring…”will always love you deeply.” Tears gather in Scully’s eyes. “Please remember me, Dana.”

Scully is dismayed by the loneliness in Mulder’s eyes. She begins to understand how deeply afraid he is of being left. He is so afraid he is projecting a future pain onto the present. She tries to lighten his mood. “I can’t imagine I’m going to forget the New Years Eve I fought zombies to keep Armageddon from happening.” They both laugh. They are perfectly at ease in this moment. Scully notices the light streaming through the window. “Fox, you need to sleep. I’m going to bring you some water and another pain pill.” “I’m afraid to sleep.” Mulder can barely keep his eyes open. “Why?” “Fucking zombies!” “I will stay and keep the zombies away.” As Scully gets the pain medication and water for Mulder he calls at her to bring the extra blanket off the couch.

Scully returns and hands him Mulder the water and medication. She unfolds the blanket. “Are you cold?” “No, it's for you.” He stretches out his left arm to her.

He lies naked under the blankets. His right shoulder is supported by pillows so he is turned slightly on his side. She climbs fully clothed on top of the blankets with only one blanket over her. She lies on her side. Her back is pressed against him. He cannot spoon her because of his right arm, but they are lying connected, his cheek against hers. She thinks he is asleep. But he says into her ear. “It's not only the first day of a New Year. It's the first day of a new century.” Scully had tried to tell him earlier that the new century begins in 2001. He had told her no one liked a math geek. She decides to let it go. “That’s right.” “Kind of a historic day for us, isn’t it?” “Yes, I guess so.” A few minutes later Mulder kisses Scully’s cheek. “I don’t know what the new century will bring, Dana, but it means a lot to me that we’re spending this first day of it together.” “There’s no where else I’d rather be.” The two agents fall asleep snuggled against each other for the first time.


	7. First three months 2000

 

After the New Years Day they spent in each other’s arms, the couple was as happy as they had ever been. They were not as intimate as they were on New Years Day again. In fact, it was a little like high school with long hours of make out sessions always ending with Mulder pulling away. “We better stop now, Scully.” Somehow it was less frustrating then not kissing. Just the fact that they were now able to acknowledge to each other that they were romantically, albeit still platonically, involved alleviated the definitional stress and, when alone, they openly showed emotion. There had been some stress over religion. Mulder seemed to mock Scully’s belief system. It had annoyed her until she realized it was his way of examining changes in his own feelings. One day while watching a documentary on television, Scully wrapped in his arm on his couch, he had told her that he was so happy he could almost believe in a God. In fact, he wanted to believe in a God, but couldn’t take the leap of faith. He had never been raised in a religious belief system and so much of organized religion was in conflict with his belief in the paranormal. Scully became aware of how close it seemed they were to meeting in the middle.

Their happiness was always so fleeting. Mulder’s mother had died, killed herself, and he was inconsolable. He had seldom talked to his mother after his illness where she had checked him out of the hospital to the cigarette smoking man. He knew she was keeping things from him. He was searching for the truth so hard and she had pieces she wasn’t willing to share with him. She always seemed so fragile he hadn’t wanted to push. Then he was guilty when he had not called her back and she had committed suicide. He was mostly confused.

The difficult night Scully told Mulder that the autopsy had confirmed his mother had killed herself, Mulder told Scully more of his family history. Things have been near normal really until his sister’s disappearance. Then his mother had withdrawn inside of herself. It was as if both parents blamed Mulder for not protecting her. That was what he thought at the time, but now he knows they both knew why and who had abducted her. The decision had been made to spare him and give up Samantha instead. How could each parent not hate Mulder a little. He was, after all, a product of infidelity. He was a reminder of choices that caused them both blame.

Scully had bitten her tongue to keep from crying out-but you were an innocent child who had no share of the blame. She had held him and let him sob knowing the little boy inside of Mulder would always be scarred.

Later, guilty and confused, Mulder had told her to go home. He had told her she should quit the X files and get away from him. He understood why she couldn’t love him. He was a child even a mother couldn’t love. He had closed and locked his bedroom door to her and she had stood with her head against the door crying as well. “I’m going to help you through this. You are not pushing me away.” She had fallen asleep sitting on the ground pressed up against the door. She woke when Skinner had knocked. Skinner had booked a flight for himself and Mulder to go to California and she had said “book three flights.”

Eventually Mulder had closure about his sister. He was grieving, but he was coping. They had begun to laugh again, have their Dana and Fox time again. Scully thought she was ready. The syndicate and the conspiracy was behind them. Fox knew the truth about his sister. There was light at the end of the tunnel. Scully thought, perhaps, it was safe to tell him she loved him. Perhaps, she could commit. She was trying to find the right time.

Before that time came, she had done something Mulder wasn’t sure he could forgive.  She had left with Spender, the cigarette smoking man, determined to find the cure for cancer.

“Mulder, you’ve taken risks without telling me for your truth. You don’t think curing cancer is worth the risk.”

“You trusted him. You put your life in danger, put yourself at risk, left me out of the equation. This man who killed my father, was responsible for the death of both of our sisters. This man I hate. How could you have trusted him?”

“I never trusted him. I thought it was worth the risk and that I could turn the tables on him.”

“You wore the dress he bought you.  Had a romantic dinner with him. Admit that you were attracted to him already.”

“If I was attracted to him, it was the part of him that reminded me of you.”

Scully had seen Mulder angry, but this controlled rage-the coldness in his eyes-aimed at her!

“Fox, there is a genetic similarity. He smirks sardonically like you. He has a charisma, a power to his personality, like you.”

“You know Diana had conflicted loyalties between us.” Mulder’s anger becomes a heartbreak sob. “So did my mom.”

“I have no conflict, Fox. He is an abhorrent human being despite his charms. You are noble and my…my friend. He is my enemy. In many ways, you are reverse mirror images of each other. My loyalties are to you, Fox, and I have proven that over and over again.” The words of the cigarette smoking man kept playing through her mind like an old vinyl album skipping. He had said to her: “you would die for him, but you would never allow yourself to love him.” Why had she held back? Why is she still afraid to admit her love to Fox?

“You are attracted to dangerous men, Scully. That’s the reality. That's your pattern. The ironic thing is you want to tame me, have me give up the X files and live a safe life, but if I did you might find out that you wouldn’t be attracted to me at all.”

Scully could only repeat. “You’ll have to forgive me, Fox. I am not your sister, your mother, or Diana. My loyalties are only to you.”


	8. Fate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Timeframe season 7 All Things

Scully thought it would be different after Mulder had closure related to his sister. With that so personal of cases solved and with the global conspiracy ended and most of the syndicate dead, their work could be more mundane and less frantic. However, Mulder’s approach to work was as frantic and obsessed as it had ever been. It just emphasized how difficult it would be to be in a romantic relationship with him over time. The work seemed without meaning to her. She was questioning every choice she had ever made and seriously thinking about the path she was on.

As for Mulder, he had pushed Scully away after she had left with that damn cigarette smoking bastard to look for the search for cancer. She seemed to have accepted the distance he imposed. Since he had come to terms with the fact of his sister being dead and since the death of his mother, he has felt like his life had no meaning really. He was directionless, adrift. He was almost forty years old and didn’t know yet what he wanted to be when he grew up. Additionally, since his father’s will had still listed his mother as beneficiary and since she had died with Mulder as her only beneficiary, he now had more money and property than he knew what to do with. The fact that he hadn’t been closed to his family and now had a family legacy of some means stirred up emotions he didn’t wish to confront. So he did the only thing he knew how to do- work obsessively on whatever case he could find to hold his attention. Besides work meant being with Scully in some fashion. It meant stakeouts and conversations. Even if she was doing an autopsy and he was running leads, it meant them working on a shared purpose. It was all he had left to live for.

He knew he had to find a balance. He knew he still loved Scully. He needed to find some way for them to reconnect on a personal level. He found an excuse of a case in England. Crop circles were hardly FBI business, but he had the money to pay for Scully and his expenses. Crop circles seemed like a good intellectual puzzle without a dangerous component. Scully would enjoy exploring the scientific explanations, he thought, and he would enjoy questioning her explanations and engaging with her in this intellectual pursuit; each challenging the other.

The choice of England was perfect for another reason. He had lived in England during a transitional period of his life. He had attended Oxford- fully separated from his parents by an ocean and not yet recruited by the FBI, not involved in paranormal pursuits, before his hypnosis regression, before he was a full blown eccentric. Once upon a time there was no “Spooky Mulder.” There was a young man, subject to moodiness, but confident about his future. He thought being there with Scully would help him “transition” to a middle age man unsure of his purpose in life except to love a woman who wasn’t sure if she could commit to a life with him. Maybe, by the time they left England, she would be sure. He had booked flights and a suite. There were two bedrooms with a shared living space and kitchenette. There would be no pressure- no single bed- but an opportunity for togetherness, if that felt right. Perhaps, in retrospect, Fox should have simply invited Dana on a social vacation to England, but they hadn’t been Fox and Dana in a while. He was surprised and hurt when Scully didn’t want to come.

Of course, without Scully to develop scientific opposition and challenge him, he was quickly bored with the case. The two bedroom suite made him feel especially lonely and pathetic. Being in England and seeing the changes made him feel old. It, also, reminded him of Phoebe. She had seduced him and he immediately fell in love. Phoebe was always so alluring to him, so seductive towards him, so unable to commit to any one person. He had been a little crazy-so far over his head-so heart broken. It only affirmed his resolve to abstain from Scully sexually until she was sure she could commit to him.

He immediately went to find Scully upon his return. They had went to his apartment and talked until almost midnight about the married man she had once been in love with and about her searching for answers. Was it fate for them to be together in some fashion? She had fallen asleep on the couch. He had covered her with a blanket and went to bed- jet lagged fatigued- exhausted.

He wakes now. He looks down at his chest and sees her petite hands on his chest. He is on his side. She is pressed against his back with her arms around him. She is nude. Her breasts against his back. Her smooth leg has worked its way between his two legs. He breathes in deeply. The sound of his breathe wakes her up.

“I hope you don’t mind. I woke up and just wanted to feel you.”

Mulder rolls over. He is still excessively tired from his travels, but he is overwhelmed by her closeness. He pulls her even closer to him. His hands caresses her ass while he kisses her. He had almost forgotten the joy of her kisses. With his lips against her ear he whispers, “Mind? I’m so happy. We are going to be so happy, Dana! Forever!”

Dana Scully pulls away. “Forever?”

Mulder reluctantly removes his hands from her ass and sits up. Scully kneels on the bed facing him with the sheet pulled up to her chest. “Last night you said it was fate. This morning you’re in my bed nude.”

“Fox, do you not find me attractive?”

“I think you know I do.” Mulder adjusts the sheets a little so they are not tenting so noticeably. He looks at her with hurt puppy eyes. “I thought that you were telling me you were ready to commit. I’m sorry if I misunderstood.”

“Fox, I want you to find me so attractive that you are desperate for me, that time stands still, that there is no present and past there is just now. I want you to want me so much now that the future be damned. “ She is beautiful. Her color is heightened by her emotion. Her bright hair against her white shoulders is mesmerizing.

“Like it was for you with your Professor Daniel? Did he want you so much that he forgot he was married with a child? Than that first time becomes many more times and suddenly you leave him, unable to forget you? Was it worth all the pain to so many people?”

Scully bursts into tears. “You make me sound like such a horrible person.”

“You are not horrible. You are wonderful and I love you. People make mistakes and hearts get broken. I’m just trying not to make that same mistake.”

Scully dries her tears with the sheet. She is embarrassed. Mulder suddenly grabs her and pulls her up to him so her body is against his. He stares in her eyes. “What happened to fate and all of our decisions leading to this moment? I love you.  Tell me you love me, Scully.".  After a few minutes he lets her go. “You can’t fight fate, Dana. Eventually you are going to be able to commit to me. I can wait until then. Fate will win out.”

Scully slowly rises and goes to the restroom to dress. Mulder lies back down. He knows he should get up and get dressed, talk to her more calmly when she gets out of the restroom, but he is so jet lagged fatigue. His body wins the fight. He quickly falls back asleep.


	9. We always disagree

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Timeframe. After Je Souhaite

The Agents, Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, had not talked about fate or love in several weeks, At first there had been some awkwardness and their work interactions were formal, but when Mulder had almost died (again) from a tobacco bug infestation and she had figured out a medical procedure (again) to save him, they had laughed together about the frequency of their hospital stays. She had brought him home from the hospital –her first time back to his apartment since the night she had climbed nude into his bed.  He had told her, in a voice raspy from so many procedures, “if saving each other’s life has gotten to be this routine, maybe we should think of another line of work.” She had told him to “shut up, Mulder” because he wasn’t supposed to be talking and he had actually, obediently, became quiet. For some reason, Mulder seemed more relaxed. He started to let cases come to him more rather than him seeking cases out and he began to take things in stride. Scully, now that she wasn’t questioning her life choices, seemed to be content with the work and with the status quo. They relaxed and enjoyed  the professional relationship. Each thought to themselves- let’s see what fate will bring us.

If Mulder was honest with himself, he would admit he had thought briefly –when he had three wishes- of wishing to make Scully be in love and commit to him, but it was a brief thought. It wasn’t fair to Scully and he would always know that it wasn’t real. The fact that his first, albeit brief, thought had been of Scully made him think it was time to prompt fate a little. He invited her over for a movie.

Mulder uses the remote control to turn off the movie. He looks down at Scully who has fallen asleep in his arms. He thinks about trying to move away without waking her and letting her sleep on the couch, but thinks better of it. “Scully, it's probably time for you to go.”

Scully groans and moves away from him. “I’m sorry, Mulder. I just- it felt so comfortable to have your arms around me.”

“Dana, you never need to apologize. Can we talk for a minute?”

Scully groans again. She is afraid of what he might say.

“Listen, I want you to know two things.” He has been trying to think of how to phrase this. He had a way of insulting her when he didn’t mean to. “There is nothing you have ever done which could make me think of you as a bad person. I don’t care who you’ve slept with or the motivations for why. I’m sure you loved Daniel and that it was a hard time for you. You made tough decisions in your life. There are things I wish I had done differently in my life. Please don’t ever take anything I say as judging you. You’re the one person I believe in no matter what. If you were perfect you wouldn’t be human and you’re not perfect, but I think you’re perfect for me in every way.”

Scully smiles at him. “The second?”

“Never doubt your beauty. You are breathtakingly beautiful. I want you. We want different things. You want me to be overcome in the moment and not think about the future and I want you to want me because you can see a future with me in it.”

“It's so humiliating, Fox, that I keep throwing myself at you and you keep rejecting me.”

“It's the same for me. I told you I loved you two years ago.”

“It's not the same. I’m crawling into bed nude with you.”

‘I’m not complaining.”

“What?”

Mulder leans over and kisses her briefly, softly. “Do you really think I mind you crawling into bed with me nude? Those few minutes of touching your ass. Besides, its very flattering…I’m still a man, Dana. What man wouldn’t appreciate having you crawl into bed with him nude? I just feel bad when I tell you no that it upsets you. If it wasn’t for that I would love the attention and effort and all the benefits. You can try to seduce me all you want, but you can’t feel rejected if I tell you no.”

“That's crazy isn’t it? Me climbing all over trying to seduce you and you saying no. Trying to convince you that you should forget about love and just have sex.”

“I’m sorry, Dana. It's pretty pathetic, isn’t it? I told you I loved you. I can’t force you to love me. It must be annoying.”

“You think I find it annoying when you tell me you love me and want to spend the rest of your life with me?” Mulder shrugs. It must get annoying over time, he thinks. “What could be more flattering than having an handsome, intelligent man tell you he wants to spend the rest of his life devoted to you?”

They sit for a while looking at each other and thinking through what the other is saying.

“Dana, this shouldn’t surprise us. We always disagree, don’t we?”

“Yes, and I’m the rational one and you’re the believer. This is the same. You want to believe we can live happily ever after and I want to try a more experiential approach to romance.  Begin with a physical experiment.”

Mulder smiles broadly at Scully’s description of horny lust as an experiential approach and physicsl experiment. “Normally neither of us back down on our opinion. Well, at least until you’re proven wrong.”

Scully smiles as well. “If that’s a challenge, then I accept.”

With that Scully grabs both of Mulder’s hands and places them firmly on each of her breasts as she goes in for the most seductive kiss of her life, Mulder rubs his hands over the outside of her blouse and enjoys the kiss. When she finally pulls her face away and looks him in the eyes, he smirks at her. “I can’t wait until the day you tell me that you love me, Dana, you know why?" Dana shakes her head. “So I can say I told you so.” He stands up and says, “Now, you better leave.”


	10. Anticipation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Timeframe. This and all future chapters are before Requiem.

 

Scully invited Mulder over to her place to watch a “chick’s flick” on a Saturday night. As they are sitting together on Friday afternoon in the basement office watching the clock slowly tick away, Mulder says, “Been a slow week, Scully. I’ve caught up on all my expense vouchers.”

Scully smiles at him. “If I wasn’t here you would be throwing pencils at the ceiling.”

“Oh, but you are and torturing you is so much more fun. I bet I could find a case for us to pursue this week-end.”

“Don’t you dare! I have a big date.” Scully looks at him with a wholesome, excited smile.

“Well, I’m glad for you. What are you plans exactly?”

“A great evening of seduction.” She leans slightly nearer to him across the desk. “I am planning on getting laid this week-end.” She sits back and blushes.

Mulder smiles at her. “I hope it works out for you, Scully. It so happens I have a big date myself.”

Scully raises her eyebrows. “You, Mulder? Rumor has it you never date.”

“Oh, I have big plans to romance a woman and sweep her off her feet. I expect to come back Monday with plans on how I expect to spend the rest of my life.”

That makes Scully blush more. Mulder opens up a desk drawer. ‘I better get some pencils sharpened for next week, so I am prepared a head of time.” Each of them are quiet for the remainder of the afternoon. They steal sideways glances at each other and smile when they realize the other agent is looking at them.

Mulder finds himself on Saturday in a wine shop trying to decide on red or white, expensive or moderate, import or domestic. The sommelier approaches him. “Sir, is there something in particular you were looking for?”

Then follows a conversation as confusing to the Wine expert as he has ever had. The occasion: a movie. He asks the tall, lean man in front of him who appeared to have no knowledge of wine whatsoever, “Do you know what food is being served?” He finds it hard not to smile when the response is popcorn maybe or a vegetable tray –if he was lucky, pizza. The wine expert tries a different approach. “Perhaps there is an especial image you want to convey or a message you want to send?”

Mulder is annoyed by the sommelier who he sees as pretentious. “I’m looking for a wine that will convince a woman to tell me she loves me and agree to spend the rest of her life with me.” The sommelier shakes his head. “No wine will do that. Although, some wine might lead a woman to be more suggestible towards a memorable evening.” Mulder looks at the man beside him and smirks. “I expect this woman will greet me at the door completely nude and ask me to bed in the first five minutes of the date.” Mulder pulls a $50 dollar California Pinot off the shelf and motions he will take that. “Excellent choice, sir” the sommelier says while thinking to himself- what an arrogant bastard.

Scully confers with Frohike at the video store. She tells him she has a date tonight with Mulder. She wants help picking out a movie. He has taken her to the science fiction rack.

“No, Frohike. I told Mulder I was showing a chick flick.”

“Scully, I don’t know anything about chick flicks. Just pick out your favorite.”

“No. I don’t really want to show him a chick flick. I want to show him one of the movies-you know- that he likes.”

“Well, Scully, we’re in the right section then. I suggest planet of the apes, 2001 a space odyssey. You know- a classic, but not too far back, no black and white.”

Scully tries to tell Frohike without being more blatant. “No, I’m trying to set a mood.”

Frohike raises his eyebrows. “I see. Horror, then. Something he likes but where you can be afraid and need to snuggle against him and avert your eyes.”

Scully makes her annoyed face. She spent New Years Eve shooting zombies and a Christmas Eve in a haunted house. She isn’t going to feign fear over any monsters in a horror movie. “That might seem a little much like work.”

Scully sighs. “Porn, Frohike. Girl on girl porn. That’s what I’m looking for. His favorite girl on girl porn.”

Frohike chokes a little. “You want to watch porn with Mulder?”

“Not especially, but I want him to be excited and then realize there's an actual woman sitting beside him and then…you know.”

“Why, Agent Scully, you surprise me and on the first date.”

Scully blushes. “We’ve been dating on and off for almost a year. I’m trying to take it further.”

“A year and he hasn’t made a move yet?” Frohike makes a mental note to razz Mulder the first chance he gets. “It sounds like you need a real man. Now I know how to seduce a woman.”

“But do you know how to seduce Mulder?”

Frohike shivers. “I know he doesn’t want to watch porn with you, Scully. He would just be embarrassed. How about a romantic movie- Casablanca or Ghost has that paranormal element but is about love that lasts even after death.”

Scully blurts out. “The last thing I need is for him to start thinking about a life together after death. It's bad enough he wants till death do us part.” She realizes Frohike has a really confused look on his face. She tells him it was probably a bad idea to involve him. Mulder and her has a kind of contest. His face gets even more confused. “Never mind, just go, Frohike.” “OK,” Frohike feels he needs to protect Mulder, “but no porn, promise me.”

Scully nods as Frohike walks out. Ok, no porn, but she needs some movie that will make Mulder think of sex and not of love. She’s needs to hurry also. She has a salon appointment for a mani/ pedi and she needs to curl her hair. Still by the science fiction rack she sees the movie Barberella with a scantily clad young Jane Fonda. She reads the description: Barberella, a 41st century astronaut sets out to combat evil scientist. Scully remember watching it in college. She remembers topless scenes of Jane Fonda, lots of talk of free love, and some type of futuristic gun. Perfect, she thinks.

Leaving the video store she looks at her watch. She has time to make a grocery list before her salon appointment. She gets into her car and pulls a small cookbook out of the glove department: “Aphrodisiac recipes.”

Mulder stands in front of a jewelry store. He stopped in front of it while walking back to the car from the flower shop. He is carrying a floral arrangements of dwarf sunflowers and daisies. He knew he did not want roses and had intended on orchids, but this bouquet seemed somewhat hopeful, sweet, wholesome- like Scully in so many ways. Should he go all out with jewelry? Of course, it's too soon for an engagement ring- although that would show her he meant business. Maybe a necklace or a real charm bracelet – show he could spring for something that wasn’t from an arcade. Feels a little too much like bribery, he decides, and heads for the car wondering what he should wear- clearly he was showing up tonight wearing his heart on his sleeve.


	11. The Datec

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Very explicit sexual content

Scully, remembering Mulder’s reaction to her black bathing suit, is wearing a black dress with a similar cut in both the front and back. She is unable to wear any type of bra with this dress. As she looks in the mirror she realizes that, if she moves just right, Mulder would have a quick, but clear view down the back of her dress. She selects a pair of lacy black underwear and removes the panties she had been wearing. She starts to put on the lacy underwear and stops thinking instead about the one thong she had. She stands looking at both pairs trying to decide before she smiles and puts them both back. Her hair is curled the way Mulder had once commented he liked and she wears only enough powder to hide her freckles and bright red lipstick. Mulder had once said he liked her make-up free. Of course, she does not put on her cross, but she takes the bracelet Mulder had given her- the arcade bracelet with the X-files related charms- and slips that onto her wrist. She decides against shoes altogether.

Mulder is wearing jeans, tennis shoes, and a grey sweater. He carries flowers in one hand and the wine in the other. He wonders if any of the neighbors will see him. He has been there enough to have met the neighbors and the building manager, but it is pretty obvious that this time he is there on a date. He knocks hesitantly. The, calling himself a pussy, he knocks more commandingly.

Scully opens the door. Mulder’s mouth falls open and he is unable to talk. “Are those for me, Fox?” He nods handing her both the flowers and wine. He follows her into the kitchen. She puts the wine next to the corkscrew and glasses she has already set out on the counter. She puts the flowers in a vase. She turns to Mulder. “Is it ok if I don’t wear any shoes?”

Without answering he reaches both hands to the side of her face and bends down to kiss her a passionate and full kiss. “You are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.” She smiles at him in appreciation. The look in his eyes makes her fully aware of the effect she is having.

“You should open the wine so it has a chance to breathe,” Scully tells Mulder. “You should try to remember to breathe as well.”

Mulder smiles and nods at her. As he is opening the wine, Scully opens up a drawer near him to get silverware.  She moves in just the right way as she walks away and he swivels quickly to watch her. “Dana, are you going commando?”

Scully blushes. “Well it's just us hanging around the apartment, so no shoes and I just threw on something comfortable. Do you mind?”

“Fuck me, Dana.” Mulder swears under his breath and looks up and down at the comfortable thing she had just thrown on.

“Oh, should we skip the movie then?” She asks innocently.

Mulder realizes he is in for a much more challenging night than he had thought. Scully has absolutely taken the challenge seriously. He turns his attention to the snacks Scully has prepared. She has set the table with two plates. Each plate has two oysters on the half shell, one half of a Merlot poached pear and an assortment of figs and dates. Beside each plate is a saucer with a cup of chocolate mouse and a chocolate covered strawberry beside the cup.

Two small wine aperitif glasses have been filled with a yellowish liquid. “We can drink the lemon cello now and the wine will have a chance to breathe so we can have it while we watch our movie.” Scully gestures at Mulder to sit down.

“Dana, am I correct that all of these food items are considered aphrodisiacs?”

“Fox, I don’t really believe in aphrodisiacs per say, but these food items should produce chemicals which stimulate the pleasure centers of the brain.”

“Using science against me?”

“Alls fair in…” Scully’s voice trails off.

“Well, before we eat then, I have a gift for you.” Mulder reaches in his pocket and brings out a little velvet bag. As Scully reaches it for he touches the bracelet she is wearing. “I’m glad you like my gifts.”

The label on the bag says Witchdoctor and Scully looks quizzically at Mulder. “It's a little shop down town.” Scully pulls out a small vial of greenish liquid. On the front is a label that saysL.P. # 9. She again looks at Mulder quizzically. “Love potion number 9- you know like the song from the fifties. If you drink it you will fall in love with the first person you see and since I’m the only one here…”

Scully laughs. “Fox, that’s ridiculous.”

“Hey, at least it's clearly label and I’m not sneaking it into your drink. You’re the one giving me food designed to turn me horny.”

Scully starts to giggle. It is the giggle Mulder first saw in a cemetery in Oregon and he loves it. It is clear that she has had so much fun deciding how to seduce him. There is a lot of benefits to dating a woman determined to get you into bed, Mulder thinks. He raises the glass of yellow liquor. “Should we drink to the future or the present?” Scully raises her glass, “To the past? To all of the adventures we’ve survived.” They clink their glasses together.

After they have finished their aphrodisiac laden snacks, Mulder carries the two glasses of wine into the living room and then goes back for the bottle. “Is it Steel Magnolias or Turning Point?” He asks Scully with his eyes twinkling. Scully tells him she has a special surprise. Mulder nods. “Is it Debbie does Dallas or Whats behind the green door?” Scully looks at Mulder in surprise. “Frohike told you.” “Couldn’t wait to question my manhood.” Scully laughs. She apologizes for involving Frohike.

“What would make you think I would want to watch porn with you?” Scully seems embarrassed. “You wouldn’t want to see some type of science fiction fantasy to get you in the mood?” “Dana, most science fiction related pornography is based on... Never mind.” “What?” It is the last thing Mulder wants to talk about. “Abduction fantasy. So is what's behind the green door, for that matter. I don’t want to watch women forced or anything disrespecting of women. I want to watch women who want to…you didn’t get any porn, did you? Frohike said he told you not to.”

Scully and Mulder are now sitting on the couch and she leans over and kisses him-not sensually but deeply and with great affection. It is Mulder’s turn to look at her quizzically. “I didn’t realize you were particular about porn based on how it portrayed women.” Mulder’s eyes open wide. “I get brownie points for that? You’re easy to please. Hey, you didn’t happen to get a Bogey and Bacall movie did you?” “No, why?” “Remember, Bacall reminds me of Tea Leoni.” “There goes all your brownie points, Fox.” Mulder laughs and kisses Scully- a very sensual kiss. “I might be having the most enjoyable night of my life, Dana.” He stares deeply in her eyes and then chuckles, “but don’t get your hopes up.”

Scully reluctantly hands him the cover to the video she had selected. “Barberella with Jane Fonda. I’ve never seen it. Have you?” Scully nods. ‘It's very 1968, summer of love, except it's science fiction set in the future with aliens on another planet.” “It says she’s an astronaut fighting evil. Let's try it.” They press play.

Scully had forgotten that by the time the opening credits are finished, Jane Fonda is already completely nude, having done an anti-gravity strip tease out of her astronaut suit. When her breasts come on the screen, Scully looks at Mulder. Mulder sees her looking and pauses the tape. He accidentally pauses it with Fonda’s firm ass up against the screen in an anti-gravity spin. “No wonder she made those work-out videos…Look, this was your selection. If we are going to watch you can’t be studying my face for my reactions.” “But you think she’s hot?”

Mulder is accustomed to Scully’s jealousy. This isn’t going to work as is. “This is what we are going to do. I am going to lie back on the couch like this and you are going to lean against me like this so you can’t see my face.” Mulder had been positioning himself and Scully, but Scully sits up and looks at him. “Unless you do that, but you’re not going to. We’re going to sit like this,” he repositions her “ and I am going to keep my arms around you while we watch the movie.” “Wait. We need the wine.” Scully reaches and pulls the two glasses and the bottle within easy reach. She drinks from her glass and turning again to look at Mulder she comments on how good it is. Mulder drinks from his glass, nods, clinks it with hers and says “here’s to women astronauts and scientists and doctors and FBI agents.” He puts his glass back on the table, but Scully continues to take large drinks out of hers. “Drink up, Dana, but remember you get horny when you’re drunk.” “You’re going to take care of that tonight.” “Keep dreaming.” He pushes the play button and they sit back to watch the movie.

Shortly into the movie, Barberella is tied up and dolls advance towards her with their sharp teeth biting. As they draw blood, Scully groans and rolls over hiding her eyes in Mulder’s neck. Mulder is reminded of her coming to his hotel room one night with mosquito bites. “Dana, you’re afraid of dolls?” He says dolls with true incredulity. Scully nods. She had been afrsiof clown dolls as a child.  Then there was the time she was on vacation and helped local police with a case involving a doll. She had mentioned it to him over the phone and he had said “like Chuckie?” Mulder is unused to a scare and timid Scully. “We can fast forward. I’m not sure why something biting her is supposed to be erotic anyway. Ow.” As he finished the sentence, Scully pulled down his sweater and bit into his shoulder. “That’s going to leave a mark.” “I didn’t break the skin. I didn’t drink your blood.” She looks into his eyes laughingly. He wonders if she knows the last woman he had slept with considered herself a vampire. “You are being very naughty. Don’t make me bring out my Chuckie doll.” She turns back around and they watch the rest of the movie with out incident.

The movie ends. Mulder pushes the remote control off. He reaches to finish what is still his second glass of wine. He notices the bottle is near empty. He does enjoy a drunk Scully. Scully asks him what he thinks of the movie.

“Worst sound-track ever. I mean it's 1968, for Gods sake. Best music ever created available and they choose that bubble gum crap.”

“I mean the premise, the plot, Jane Fonda.”

“There can be nothing unpleasant about seeing a young, naked Jane Fonda, but it does point to deeply rooted sexism in the entertainment industry which persists until today.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Jane Fonda is a seriously talented actress, but in order to gain quality parts she first had to do this terribly written, infantile, movie where the whole premise is let's put this innocent, naïve woman into situations where she is sexually tortured so we can laugh at her having orgasms. Then, we wonder why women are victimized and aren’t taken seriously in their professions.”

“Fox, she is a woman of power as is the black queen, tyrant. Yes, she is objectified but so are the men. There is the scene of the man in the bowl and women smoking hookahs getting the essence of man and then that angel in his loin-cloth. I mean that's some eye candy and he was tied up and tortured as well.”

“So it's ok to objectify women as long as you also objectify men. What happened to my brownie points from earlier for not wanting to see women forced?”

“But in many of the scenes she wanted sexual adventures. I think you’re afraid of women claiming their sexual freedom and liberation.”

“Sexual liberation and freedom being Jane Fonda in one ridiculous outfit after another. Two scenes where she is trapped and bitten by little teeth. That’s ridiculous. I work with a strong, independent woman who has my back every day. If Scully was sent against that scientist, the movie would have been over in fifteen minutes.”

“Meaning Scully would have captured the bad guys without being distracted by the sexual pleasures available on that planet.”

Mulder realizes Scully is taking this way too seriously. She has stood up and is walking around the living room. “Well, that angel might have distracted her a little, but I probably would have walked in on her right as they were getting ready to do the deed.”

Scully bursts into tears. Mulder rushes over to her and hugs her. He brings her back and sits her on the couch. He holds her hands. “I was joking, of course, and we disagree on a movie. We disagree on a lot of things.”

“It's not the movie. Well, except I hoped the movie would excite you.”

“Dana, do you think seeing Jane Fonda naked could compare to seeing you in that dress? You’re the seductive element in this room tonight.”

“I had so much fun with the thought of this as a challenge- my trying to get you into bed…just how sexy of an evening could I plan?”

“It's perfect. You’re perfect. The food was perfect. The dress and no…shoes…and other garments is perfect. What's perfect about the movie is you tried to pick out something sexy and science fiction thinking I would like it. Dana, truthfully, how did you feel about the movie?”

“I hated it. Give me Caddy Shack any day.” Mulder laughs.

“Dana, I am having the most wonderful time with a woman who is as sexy as anything I could imagine.” Mulder kisses her softly.

“But it's a challenge I can’t meet. No matter what I do you won’t want to have sex with me, so you’re enjoying yourself with my efforts, and I’m enjoying it to, but I don’t think you appreciate what I am going through.”

“First of all saying I don’t want to have sex with you is not accurate.”

“Fox, shut up and listen to me. There was a time when I wanted to have casual sex with you, but nothing between us now could be casual. You’re…” Scully struggles to find the right definitional word. “My boyfriend? My boyfriend who I’ve dated for a year and without saying I’m sure we will be together next year or five years or twenty years from now-you’re my boyfriend now and I want to have sex with you. I’m not able to fulfill my needs independently. With women so much of our orgasm is more emotional than physical. I don’t want anyone else- not even that angel- I want you because I care so deeply about you. I want to show you how much. It's become a craving, almost. It's so hard to even think about anything else. I thought this challenge piece of seeing which of us would win would be fun, but it's not because its not a game. If we are boyfriend and girlfriend, then we need to figure this out so it doesn’t just drive us- me, at least, crazy.”

Mulder wants to tell her that they have known each other seven years, been dating for one, and if she isn’t willing to commit to him now she likely never would be, but that is not how he wants tonight to end. She has tried so hard to make him hear her truth, her pain and her struggle. She is the woman he loves and she is more beautiful tonight than he has ever seen her. They are sitting beside each other on the couch. He pulls her back into the position they had been in while watching television. He whispers in her ear. His voice is husky as if his throat is full of the moisture his eyes will not shed. “I have a short term solution. Remember New Years when you gave me some pleasure. I can do that for you.”

Scully is lying on her back on top of Mulder. She shakes her head. “I can’t let you do that if we haven’t.” She blushes and buries her head in his arms. That would be so intimate to begin with.

“I don’t have to use my mouth. You know the part of that movie I did like is where she’s in that machine and the evil scientist is playing the machine like a piano and she’s suppose to die with pleasure, but she short circuits the machine because she can withstand so much pleasure.”

Scully looks at him and throws back his words to him.  “Yeah, where she is trapped and being sexually tortured and we’re laughing at her having orgasms.”

Mulder sighs. “Yes, I know, but you’re not trapped and I’m not an evil scientist. But the thought that you’re in a machine,” Mulder begins to rub his fingers on the outside of Scully’s dress. “The machine is like a piano and the keys are striking all of your pleasure centers and I’m the one playing the instrument.”

His hands goes to her shoulders. He kisses her neck as he pulls down her shoulder straps. Her breasts are bare. He rub his hands over them lightly. He moves his fingers as if likely touching a keyboard. The middle fingers of each hand strike against her nipples simultaneously. Mulder and Scully seem to both barely be breathing and then they are breathing heavily, their breathing matched to one another. Mulder right hand plays the keys down her bare stomach while his left hand reaches to pull her dress up. Now his right hand is lightly touching her pubic hair. He plays with it. It is soft and curly. He feels it up and down her labia with three fingers of his right hand alternating, playing a lively tune. “Fox, talk to me while.” He whispers in her ear. “You want me to talk to you?” “Your voice, Fox, sometimes when we’re on the phone.” He chuckles-low and deep. Then, he whispers in a voice even lower while his middle finger slips beneath the folds touching lightly her clit down to her opening and back to the clit, “do you touch yourself while we’re talking on the phone?”

“Yes,” Scully whispers. Mulder brings his left hand up and squeezes her left nipple between the thumb and fore finger. Her right index finger is now lightly going round and round the outside of her vaginal opening. “You touch yourself while we talk about work and flight plans and what I’m watching on television?” His voice seems to be a growl, guttural, but with a light coolness lingering at the end of each word.

“I don’t think you know how sexy your voice is.” Mulder sits up now bringing Scully with him. He repositions her so his right hand is on her right tit. He has forgotten he is playing a keyboard now. He is grasping and squeezing. His mouth is now near her left ear. “Your breasts are the perfect size. They’re so soft.” His left hand reaches all way down, spreads her, his index finger enters her, moving around, up and down, exploring. “You have to tell me. What you like? How it feels?”

Scully grabs his left hand. She hold his hand in place while she sits up, spins her body. She is now facing Mulder. He is sitting up with his left arm extended. She is crouching in front of him. Her hands now on his shoulders. “I want to see your eyes.” She undulates over his finger, up and down, clockwise for a while, then simply up and down. He puts his right thumb on her clit, positions it so that when she bounces off his left index finger her clit brushes his thumb, when she moves away from his thumb she bounces back down directly on his left index finger. It is not what he had in mind. She is doing the work, moving her body against only two of his fingers. He had intended for him to do the work while she laid back, but she has taken control in a very Scully like fashion. He imagines her taking control in the act.   He watches her breasts bounce. She is breathing heavier. Her back is arched differently as she forces his index finger to rub and down her vaginal wall with every thrust. She bites her lower lip. Mulder takes the palm of his right hand and forces it against her clit once. She gasps.   He rises his body, holds her around the waist with his right arm and puts his left thumb on her clit moving it quickly. Her back arches pressing her breasts against him once, twice, three times and then she quickly let's out her breathe and collapses against him kissing his cheek. He slowly removes his left hand and lays back down pulling her back down on top of him. They lie there for a few minutes with his hand rubbing and massaging her ass.

She looks into his eyes. Then she quickly looks down. “Look at me” he demands and she does. They gaze for a while and she says, “I need to get off of you.” He says in a still husky voice “Be careful. I’m sensitive…” His eyes lower to his crotch. Scully moves slightly and sees his pants bulging. She reaches down to unzip his pants. She reaches for his penis and he catches her hand. “No.” “This is torture for you too” Scully says in a surprised voice. “Of course it is, what did you think?” “Then let me.” She tries to reach again. He catches her hand again. “No. One thing leads to another and then there is no stopping.”

Scully sits up carefully and moves to the end of the couch. Mulder sits up. He takes a couch cushion from the back of the couch and lays it on top of him. Scully shakes her head. “We have to do better than this for each other.” Mulder face falls with disappointment. “No. It was great. Thank you. I’m…better, but, Fox, it's foreplay really.” “Talk dirty to me, Dana, I will explode.” Mulder tries levity to cut the tension.

“Maybe that's what we should do is talk dirty to each other while we each take care of ourselves.” Mulder looks at her like she is crazy. “The only time I ever come close by myself is when I’ve started while we are on the phone.”

“Oh my god, I thought you were joking. You really do that without telling me?”

“You like phone sex.”

“When I know I’m having it. I can’t have phone sex with you, Dana, I have phone sex with anonymous women.”

Scully continues to put her problem solving skills to work in solving this dilemma. “Phone sex is anonymous and pornography is fantasy?” Mulder nods. “Can I be a fantasy? Imagine I’m a woman in a movie. Only its in the future and I’m a three D character and interactive so you control my action. You tell me what you want me to do and you watch me and take care of yourself and because I will hear your voice I will be able to take care of myself. It will just be fantasy, pretend, and you can keep that part of your heart you’re trying so hard to protect unencumbered.”

Mulder shakes his head, but Scully could be stubborn. “To bad we don’t have an anti gravity chamber. Do I look anything like Jane Fonda?” Scully hikes up her dress, turns around and bends over, showing her ass to Mulder. Mulder pressed the cushion covering his groin down harder. “Christ, Dana.” She stands and turns to him with an eager face. He shakes his head. He throws the cushion he is holding to Scully. “Sit on this with your ass all the way forward. I want you to sit so I can see some of your ass and all of your…” He sighs. “Hike your dress up and drop the shoulders straps so I can see your breasts completely. Dana, you’re going to have to close your eyes.” Scully starts to protest. “No, Dana, the women in the movies don’t see me and if they did it would be creepy.”

Scully complies with all his requests. “Dana, could you begin by putting your hands over your head and just wiggling your breasts.” Scully does. “Fox, remember you need to keep talking. That’s your part is I get to hear your voice.”

“Ok, just keep wiggling and bouncing. Your breasts moving like that. I’ve thought about your breasts so often. The times you wear those t-shirts and you run. Oh, I love your breasts. They’re so beautiful. Now stop, bring your hand. Will you spread your butt cheeks, please and run your fingers up and down your butt crack? I love your fingers. You’re so small, but your fingers seem long in comparison and they do so many things so well. They’re so soft when they touch me. How can you keep them so soft when you’re always scrubbing in for autopsies and cleaning your gun? They’re amazing. Move your fingers to your clit now, Dana. Just do what you want- take care of yourself and I will watch. What I think about when we’re on the phone is your fingers. I’m not sure if you know how often you touch me. You run your hands through my hair, you touch my cheek, my arms repeatedly throughout the day. When we’re on the phone I’m thinking about you touching me in all the other places where you don’t typically touch me…”

Scully, still remembering Mulder earlier touch, is trying to touch her clit, her vaginal opening exactly as he had started out-like playing piano keys, imagining them as his fingers. She is listening to his voice talk about her fingers. His voice alternates between smooth whiskey and gravelly bourbon with honey poured over both and sometimes vibrates so you can hear it rumbling up from his chest before he says the words and hangs on the air still vibrating after he is through. “Fox, you have to keep talking. Fox?” She opens her eyes. Mulder is no longer looking at her. He has stood up and zipped his pants. There is no bulge. She thinks she has failed him. Was not quite good enough. He feels her looking at him and makes eye contact.

“This is wrong. Look what we are doing to keep from having sex. You’re not a fantasy woman and you’re not a cheap whore for me to treat this way. You’re the love of my life.” He strides to Scully, lifts her off the floor and brings her to the wall in what seems like one fluid motion. She is against the wall. Her breasts still expose. He puts a hand on either side of her and his knee in between her legs.

“Do you still want me inside of you? Tell me that you do.” Scully nods and then seeing his eyes she says yes out loud. “I want you so much. You were right, Dana. I want you so much in this moment to Hell with any future.”

He kisses her quickly once on the lips and then move to her neck. He runs his mouth up and down her neck alternating kisses with words. “What ever you want, Dana, if it's just tonight or if it's just whenever you want. I will be yours whenever you want me as long as I can touch and feel you tonight.” His hands move to her breast and his mouth moves back to her lips.

Scully know this is what she wanted, but he expresses it in such a way it sounds like a starving man grateful for the crumbs that fall to the floor. She doesn't want to be in control-not really- their partnership had always been that of a mutual respect and based on their different but equal perspectives. That’s what she loves about him and what else could it be but love. Spender had said, “you would die for him but won’t allow yourself to love him.” It is her thst has held back a little piece of her heart for protection and afraid to commit.  She doesn’t want to cheat this moment.   Thinking of Sex now as an experiential exploration or a physical experiment would make it less than it is. Then the next time would be the next time and so forth and so on, but this really is the first time of many times to come. Of course, they will be compatible sexually. They are the complete opposite perfect fit in every part of their life.

“Fox, wait.” He has pulled her away from the wall- still kissing her- leading her in a meandering way towards the bedroom. “Wait.”

“Dana, don’t say no now, please.”

“I want to tell you that you’re right.” She takes his face in between her hands. “I love you and this moment is so much more because I am about to make love for the first time to the only man I will ever make love to again. It is the first time out of a lifetime to come. I love you so much. I think I have since the first moment we met.”

Now he bends down to his knees to rub his hands over her ass, put his face against her bare belly. He stands up, kissing her breasts on the way. He is so much taller than her. He puts his hands on her face and tilts her head up, brings his lips down for a kiss. “Dana,” he says staring deep into her eyes, “I told you so.”

She screeches breathlessly and tries to get away. He picks her up and holds her in his two arms. “Stop squirming. I will drop you.”

She locks her hands around his neck. They gaze into each other's eyes with knowing smiles on their lips. He looks her up and down. He has carried her before. He had slung her over his shoulder and climbed, running when on level ground, out of a space ship to save her. She has never seemed as light and yet as substantial as she does now. He looks back into her eyes with a twinkle in his own that promises a good time. Then he carries her into the bedroom.


	12. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Before Requiem

Mulder doesn’t like having conflicting feelings, but the older he gets the more he findsp that life is full of greys even where his desires are concerned. He sits in his living room on a Sunday afternoon. Scully seemed tired all week-end, but he convinced her not to go home. Instead she is taking a nap in his bed. He promised when she woke up she would have control of the remote control and her choice of pizza toppings, but he wasn’t willing to have her leave yet to go back to her apartment. Mulder has just hung up the phone from talking to Skinner. 

It has been six weeks since Mulder and Scully have officially become a couple. They have developed a bit of a routine. Tuesday date nights either at Scully’s or at a restaurant or movie. No sex because it was important they find a balance after their initial couple of weeks where sex consumed their relationship. Wednesday is Scully’s evening at her mother’s with no expectation they would see each other, but often Scully would knock on Mulder’s door asking if she could just fall asleep beside him. Thursday is copulation night-not officially, just in Mulder’s mind, because by Thursday with no sex for four days Scully was hungry, eager, often saying she was desperate for him. Friday, Mulder left work early, drove to his mother’s home where he was gradually going through the family’s belongings- starting with the attic-before visiting her grave and driving home Saturday morning. It is an odd thing. Since being with Scully he was finding he had the strength to deal with his past and, through the conversations at her graveside he couldn’t have with her when she was alive, he was beginning to forgive his mother. Saturday afternoon until early Sunday evening is couple’s spontaneous time-usually sleeping at his place. He always got the feeling at Scully’s someone was watching. Just paranoia, Scully told him, and wouldn’t let him do the security sweeps for spying equipment that he still, weekly, did on his own apartment. 

He suppose the routine would vary if they were active on cases out of the immediate area, but recently he hadn’t thought any cases coming across his desk was worth the travel. 

Scully had suggested he moved into her apartment , but it seemed like such a waste since he had already paid for his apartment a year in advance. Scully had been aghast. “I had the money, Scully, and it seemed more efficient than writing monthly checks.” He didn’t want to tell Scully how many times he had forgotten to write those checks when they were busy on a case –how much he had paid in late fees over the years simply because he was absent minded. Scully did not want to live in his apartment which was small and so, they had decided to delay shacking up for a year. This week-end they went to open houses on sale-not that they expected to buy soon, but they needed to start the discussion –large or small, back yards, how big of a garage, separate dining room or larger kitchen. It had felt so surreal, identifying to real estate agents as a couple-looking to buy their first home. 

When Scully complained of being tired they had came home early. He snuggled with her in his bed. He asked, “Dana, if you could live anywhere in the country?” “This is where our jobs are.” “There has to be an end sometime. I’m aging. Can you really see us chasing monsters fifteen years from now?” “I can retire from the FBI at fifty, Fox, if I stay in.” “I just think maybe we should think through if this is still what we want to do.” Scully had turned over so they were facing each other in the bed. “Fox, you’ve always been so passionate about your work. Are you sure your ready to give it up?” “Not now, but in a year or two…” “For me, Fox, because you think it's what I want?” “Isn’t it?” “I could work for the FBI teaching at Quantico. You could go back to profiling.” Mulder shivers. “I would be bored silly.” “So if you left the FBI what would you do?” Mulder shooked his head. He had no concept. “Don’t do it for me, Fox.” “I just know nothing as has much meaning now as being with you.” “Because we’re new, but healthy relationships can’t sustain over time unless people have other passions. I don’t think you’re ready to give it up. Maybe you just need a break- a trip somewhere.” “I don’t know.” “Fox, you’re going through a lot. Grieving your mother, all the emotions of going through your family belongings, a new relationship.” “I know. I just wanted to let you know that I was considering, reestablishing my priorities..”

Then, Skinner had called and suddenly he was defensive, protected, how dare they threaten to close down the X-files again. He felt he would fight until the death for the importance of this work. Skinner apologized. The charges on the agency’s card from the evening following the premiere of "the Lasarus Bowl" had caught someone’s eye. Skinner had taken full responsibility. The authorizations were his, but the agents had already been noticed because of their appearance on Cops and then the movie. The expense reports are just an excuse. They are auditing all of the last years X file expenses against the results- calling it an evaluation. Bullshit bureaucracy and politics. 

Scully walks out to the couch. She looks still tired, her hair messed up. Mulder opens his arms. She reclines against him and he wraps the blankets around her. He hands her the pizza menu and the remote.   
“Did I hear you talking to Skinner?” “We are going through a cost /results financial evaluation tomorrow.” “Should we go in the office to prepare?” “What's to prepare? It is what it is. We travel because none of the field offices have our expertise. We don’t close cases. We can defend it, but we can’t change the numbers.” “You’re worried.” “Yes. I’ve been trying to figure out why I’m so angry when I just have been saying I might leave.” “You’ll never stop investigating the paranormal, Fox, even if you do it on your own.” 

Scully looks at the menu. “Is anchovies, garlic and pineapple a strange combination?” “Yes.” Scully looks at Mulder and he places the order. Whatever she wants. He almost makes the heartless remark asking if she was pregnant, but catches himself. “Fox, have I told you that I love you?” “Not today.” “I love you.” He smiles and kisses her. He no longer needs to ask her to tell him she loves him. “Sixty minutes, Dana?” “I think ‘touched by an Angel is on.’ Mulder looks at Scully. “I said you were in control.” “I like to imagine that someday we will be asked to investigate a mysterious angelic creature who solves everybody’s problem. Wouldn’t you like to be touched by an Angel, Fox?” She reaches up and touches his cheek. He thinks to himself that he just was touched by an Angel and he holds her tighter. No matter what the future holds, he has faith in their relationship. Together forever!


End file.
